


Calm Before Storm

by norwegian_galaxies



Category: Hetalia: Axis Powers
Genre: Alternate Universe - Human, Alternate Universe - Soulmates, And he's magical!!!, Ber's a sweetie, Brothers care about each other, Crying, Kissing, Lovi's also a ghost, Lukas is tsundere, M/M, Magic, Magic Trio (Hetalia), Matthias is also a sweetie, Mattie's a ghost, Platonic Soulmates, Romantic Soulmates, So is Gil, Spellbook, Su has a bad memory, They are all good friends, Tino is kidnapped, Tino spends too much time around Matthias, but it's not his fault, by Ivan, sometimes, spells
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-19
Updated: 2018-07-21
Packaged: 2019-06-12 23:15:13
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 20
Words: 27,332
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15350889
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/norwegian_galaxies/pseuds/norwegian_galaxies
Summary: Berwald Oxenstierna forgot everything when his soulmate was taken away. In this world, soulmates see each others faces in the clouds. He still sees his, but knows nothing about him-except that his name is Tino.When Tino comes back one night, everyone thinks things are going to be all right.But, they aren't, of course.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> This was a Hetalia fanfic I wrote on Wattpad. So, it's been cross-posted and put on here so you guys can read it, too.  
> I hope it isn't cringy, after all, it was my first Hetalia fanfic -_-  
> Anyway, sit back, relax, and enjoy the ride XD

Gardening wasn't necessarily something Berwald did for fun. But he liked growing his own food, instead of eating the store-bought stuff, with all the chemicals and such inside. He kept every blade of grass perfect, none taller than the other. And the garden itself was perfectly measured, no plant out of its place.

The air was chill, as per usual. The sky was pale blue and clouds drifted slowly through it. The shapes inside the clouds kept changing, but they all stayed similar, in a way.

But whoever's face that Berwald had once been able to see inside the fluffy white clouds, he couldn't recognize it now. His memory had long since left him, and he didn't understand the face he saw whenever he looked up.

Berwald ran his fingers through his hair and sighed. He couldn't stop staring up at the sky. It was time to go back inside.

And then, just before he turned, something glinted on one of the carrots in the garden.

Berwald's blue eyes narrowed, and he looked closer. The source was at the base of the plant, and it was gold. Diamonds studded the golden band, and a beautiful star sapphire was in the center.

A ring?

He bent down and pulled the ring from the plant, studying it.

When it caught the light, the sapphire's six-pointed star reminded him of the stars in the sky.

A memory awoke in the back of his head. The face he saw in the clouds had a ring, just like this. Berwald gave it to him, for...for what? Where was he? Who was he? What had he been to Berwald?

Of course, whoever he was was his soulmate. Everyone could see the faces of their soulmates in the clouds.

But Berwald didn't remember anything about the face he saw in the clouds, or in the small memories he was able to salvage every now and then.

He only knew that whoever it was had been missing for years, and had left around the time the Swedish man's memory had.

Berwald stepped out of the garden and walked back into the house.

He lived with his friends, Lukas, Emil, and Matthias. They seemed to remember Berwald's soulmate, and sometimes mentioned a man named Tino. But the name didn't call forth memories like the ring had.

Matthias greeted him brightly as he walked in. "Hey, Berwald!"

Berwald grunted in response, and continued to walk into the kitchen, where Lukas and Emil were talking about who knew what.

"Hey! Aren't you gonna say 'hey'?" Matthias followed him into the room, frowning.

Berwald didn't like it when Matthias frowned, so he mumbled, "Hey," before staring down at the ring in his hand.

Lukas jumped and turned to look at the ring, which glinted in the fluorescent lights above.

"Tino?!"

Emil raised his eyebrows as he stared at it, then nodded. "Berwald, where did you find it?"

"In the garden."

The silence in the room was painful. Berwald winced, but tried not to let anyone see it.

Matthias smiled. "This has GOT to be a sign!" He cried, flopping down in one of the spinny chairs, spreading his legs out, trying to touch his toes.

"Matthias, would you stop spreading your legs?" Lukas grumbled, adjusting the cross in his hair.

Of course, the ball of happiness didn't comply, and just spread them wider. Lukas, Emil, and Berwald looked away.

"Where in the garden was it?"

"It was on a carrot," Berwald said, pushing his glasses up his nose. Why do they seem so on-edge?

"Tino is definitely coming back soon," Lukas said, rubbing his eyes. "I know for certain."

Emil nodded.

"Who's Tino?"

They all sighed. Even Matthias closed his legs and frowned. "Your memory seriously messed up the minute he left," The Dane said. "You still miss him, even if you don't remember him."

"Where is he?"

"With... _Ivan_." There was hatred in Emil's voice.

Berwald closed his eyes and tried to remember. But he couldn't. His memories were still as bad as they were before.

"Tino was the sweetest, kindest person we ever knew," Matthias sighed, swallowing hard. "He loved Christmas, and Santa Claus, and saunas. He loved you, too."

Everyone was silent for a few moments.

Then, a knock on the door startled them out of their memories.

"Hey, maybe it's Tino!" Matthias said, jumping out of the chair and running over to the door.

Berwald looked at Lukas, and Lukas gave a slight head shake. _No_.

Matthias learned that, too, and fast. Standing in the doorway was just the mailman, who held out a small cardboard box. "Is this the...uh...Køhler household?"

Berwald stepped in front of Matthias, who looked crushed. "Yes, hello."

The mailman immediately cowered back.

Berwald raised his eyebrows. "Hm?"

The mailman handed Berwald the box and jogged away, stuttering to himself.

Suddenly, Berwald froze.

He shut the door and walked past Matthias, who was sulking, into the kitchen, where Emil and Lukas were arguing.

"I TOLD you he was going to be crushed! Why didn't you tell him about-?"

"I-"

Berwald shoved the box under their noses, cutting them off.

"What the..."

"There's something inside," Lukas said. "Are you going to open it or not?"

"It's from Tino..." Emil said, looking over at Lukas.

"It is?!" Matthias cried, running back into the room, excited. "Are you going to open it?"

Berwald nodded. "Soon."

"How soon?"

This question was left unanswered.

 


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter's mostly dialogue n' shit.   
> And DenNor :3  
> Enjoyyy~

Berwald sat up.

It was pitch black and freezing cold inside his room.

Yet somehow, he was sweating. It was freezing, and he was sweating. And his heart was pounding.

He reached over and grabbed his glasses from the nightstand and looked at the alarm clock next to his bed. 3:00 AM, it read.

He pinched the bridge of his nose and picked up the glass of water he had gotten before he went to sleep. Taking a few sips, the cold water calmed him down and woke up his mind enough for him to realize that he had been dreaming, and that the night terror wasn't real.

Berwald wiped off his mouth and set the water glass down, rubbing his head. Pulling the sheets up closer around him, he took off his glasses and set them on the nightstand once again, closing his eyes and willing himself to go back to sleep.

*

When he awoke again, the room was full of sunshine.

The box he had gotten in the mail was on the pillow beside him, and Matthias was in the doorway, clanging pots and pans. "WAKE UP, SLEEPYHEAD!"

Berwald covered his ears and sighed.

Lukas walked up behind Matthias and snatched the pots and pans away from him, banging them once right by the other man's ear, then taking them back to the kitchen.

Matthias followed after him, begging for the pans back so he could make breakfast.

Berwald put on his glasses once again and picked up the box, turning it over in his hands. It was just cardboard, nothing special. The only thing special about it was that it was apparently from his soulmate, the face he kept seeing in the clouds.

And now, that face had a name.

_Tino._

He shook it, hoping to get an idea on what was inside.

If Lukas, Emil, and Matthias knew who their soulmates were, they were definitely being quiet about it. Berwald had never even heard the word "soulmate" in their conversations, excluding the times that they were talking about him and Tino.

He wondered what Tino was like. Matthias said he was sweet and kind. He also said he loved Christmas, Santa Claus, and saunas.

_And that he loved me._

Berwald obviously felt strongly about him too.

After all, they were soulmates.

"Berwald."

Emil was standing in the doorway, now. His face was stoic, as usual. The puffin stuffed animal he always carried around, Mr. Puffin, was clutched tightly in his hands.

Berwald looked up.

"Are you going to open it?"

"Not sure," he said quietly, looking down at it.

"You know who Lukas and Matthias see?"

"Who?"

Emil's face broke into a sad smile, though he was clearly trying to hide it. "Each other."

Berwald sucked in a breath. _Well, then, how'd they hide it so well?_

Then Emil frowned. "I don't see anyone in the clouds. Does that mean that there's no one out there for me?"

Berwald's breath caught in his throat. Emil didn't see _anyone_ in the clouds?

"Lukas and Mathias see each other. You see Tino. I just see shapes. Random white blobs," Emil sighed.

"Oh."

Berwald picked at the tape closing the flaps of the box.

"I suggest you open it."

He nodded at Emil, and the Icelander gave him a thumbs up, before walking back out of the room.

The blonde continued staring down at the box and sighed, looking around the room for a pair of scissors. He knew he had some.

"Berwald, come get some breakfast!"

_Or...maybe not._

He'd get the scissors after breakfast.

When he walked into the kitchen, everyone had already finished eating. Matthias was talking excitedly about something, blue eyes bright and happy. Lukas and Emil just blinked at him, bored. The taller of the two careless brothers even yawned.

Berwald honestly found it hard to believe that him and Matthias were friends, _much_ less meant for each other. He sat down and looked down at the food in front of him.

"Rundstykker, tebirkes, and wienerbrød!" Matthias said, grinning.

Berwald nodded and started eating. The Dane always made breakfast when he was happy (which was pretty much all the time).

"You certainly took your time," Lukas said, looking at Berwald out of the corner of his eye.

"He was probably debating on whether to open the box alone or around us," Matthias chuckled, waving it off.

"I was about to open it, but I couldn't find any scissors."

Lukas walked over to a drawer and threw a pair of scissors at him. They landed on the table in front of Berwald, who picked them up and set them next to the plate.

"I'm going to be late for work now, because of you," Matthias teased, ruffling the Swede's blonde hair. Matthias worked on furniture, building tables and chairs and making them look nice.

He hugged Emil, before making his way over to Lukas, who awkwardly hugged Matthias in return when he wrapped his arms tightly around him. "Goodbye," the Dane smiled, running his fingers through his hair before turning, putting on his coat, and walking out the door.

Berwald saw it now. A small flicker of sadness crossed Lukas' face before he turned, noticed Berwald watching him, and blushed, ever so slightly.

The emotion faded away.


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, by now, you've probably figured out the soulmate AU.   
> Well, I guess it's not really a "soulmate" AU. The clouds really just take the shape of who you're destined to love, whether it be platonic love or romantic love.   
> I wrote this fic, because I wanted people to understand that there's more kinds of love than romantic love. Sure, a lot of people do, but then, a lot of people don't, too.  
> Just like the last chapter, this is mostly dialogue. Actually, I think all the chapters are like that.   
> I've improved in writing since then, don't worry -_-   
> So, yeah. Without further ado: Chapter Three!

Lukas and Emil were arguing about something inside the house while Berwald was outside again, working. Some of the violet flowers he really liked were growing. He picked one and sat down in the dark green grass, looking at it. Did Tino like these flowers? He knew he hadn't planted the flowers, and that they had been there for a long time. Had Tino planted them?

Laying down in the grass, he stared up at the sky. The white clouds took the shape of Tino's face.

Of course they did.

He held the violet flower up to the sky. The color looked beautiful against the light blue.

Berwald closed his eyes, sighed, and brought the flower back down to rest over his heart.

*

Berwald's eyes snapped open, and he sat up, dropping the flower. Matthias' car was back, and the sounds of arguing inside the house had ceased.

He stood up and walked towards the house, after picking up the flower again. What time is it?

When he opened the door, Matthias and Lukas were sitting down together, and Emil wasn't there. They looked up at Berwald, startled. "Um, hi," Matthias said, face a bit pink. He dropped Lukas' hand and rested his own on his thigh.

Lukas stood up and walked away.

"Where is Emil?" Berwald said quietly, curling his fingers around the small flower.

"Emil's in his room. He said the craziest thing to Lukas, did you know?"

"What did he say?"

"He said he didn't see anyone in the clouds!"

The Swedish man froze.

"I'm kind of worried about him. He's becoming more and more reserved...has he said anything to you?"

Emil was the youngest of all four of them. He was 17, while Lukas was 20, and Matthias and Berwald were both 21.

"No," Berwald replied, walking away.

Matthias stood up, face suddenly serious. "Look, Berwald, you have your own problems, and I get that. But if Emil said anything at all about that to you, please tell us."

"I will."

At the same time, Emil's door opened, and he walked out, carrying Mr. Puffin, frowning. "Why are you talking about me like I'm not here?"

Matthias stared at him, blue eyes wide. "What, are we not allowed to care about you?"

"You can, but don't talk behind my back."

Matthias rolled his eyes and sighed. "Tell Lukas to get his ass out here, okay? We need to talk about this as a group."

"Fine," Emil grumbled, closing his eyes, then turning around to get Lukas out of his room.

Berwald turned back around to look at Matthias, who still looked agitated. He sat back down in his chair, rubbing his eyes. "Did you open the box yet?"

The Swede shook his head.

"You know you have to open it eventually."

"I know."

"I think I'm going to go to sleep in tomorrow morning. I'm gonna call my boss."

Berwald looked over at Matthias, for the first time noticing the bags under his eyes. "Why?"

"I haven't been able to get much sleep, just like you. Something's wrong with me," he said, as Lukas and Emil walked back in the room.

"What do you need?" Lukas asked, bored already. He looked tired, too.

Berwald sat down on the couch, rubbing his eyes. The fatigue in the room was contagious-either that, or he just hadn't noticed his own before.

Matthias stood up and walked over to Emil, who looked uncomfortable. "Emil, do you see anyone in the clouds?"

"I don't, not anymore."

"Why?" Lukas prompted, looking over at him.

Emil hesitated, before answering, not looking at anyone or anything in particular. "The person that was once my soulmate is now taken by another."

Berwald froze. He had heard of couples that weren't soulmates dating, but he'd never witnessed it in person. "But-isn't that-"

They turned to him, eyes wide.

"Isn't that...against the rules?"

"They're soulmates too, though."

_What?_

"Wait, so it's not-?" Lukas looked alarmed for probably the first time in his life. "But who-"

Emil pressed a finger to his lips. "I'm getting a blood test done tomorrow just in case. And if it's what I think, then-"

Suddenly, Lukas looked like he understood. "Well, if it's true, then...you have to call me Big Brother."

"WHAT?!"

Lukas frowned at Emil, who looked down at his lap, tapping his fingers against the arms of his chair. "Lukas might be my brother. We've suspected it for a while, but-"

Matthias looked from Emil to Lukas, back and forth. "So he-"

"Emil has seen me in the clouds," Lukas said, turning his indigo gaze on Matthias, who looked really confused, and slightly hurt. "Platonically, of course." He added, after seeing Matthias' reaction.

Berwald watched the scene unfold as though he was watching a movie on TV; able to watch, feel the character's pain, but unable to do anything.

Emil's face was bright red, and his head was in his hands. Lukas looked the same as usual. Matthias looked like he was going to throw up.

Berwald coughed, breaking the silence, and everyone looked over at him.

"What?" Matthias asked, raising his eyebrows.

"W-well..." Berwald paused. "Maybe we should sleep on this. Everyone seems really tired right now."

Everyone stared at him, and Emil stood up, walking away, slamming his bedroom door shut for the hundredth time that day. Matthias was second to leave, not even looking at Lukas, who frowned and started following him.

"Wait," Berwald said, setting a hand on his shoulder.

Lukas turned around. "Yes?"

"You were acting like Emil had seen someone else in the sky before."

"Well, he told me once that he saw someone. The person looked Asian, so he said. He had shoulder-length dark hair, but I think it was just an excuse to cover up the fact that he had seen me."

Berwald frowned. "What if you are his brother?"

Lukas pursed his lips. "It doesn't matter. I don't think that the soulmate thing is meant to be romantic in his case. Emil's not really the type to want to be romantic with his brother, unlike Natalya..."

Berwald almost asked who Natalya was, but stopped himself. "And...Matthias?"

Lukas froze up, his indigo eyes full of worry. "I-I don't know..."

Berwald sighed.

"You ought to open that box, you know. Tino is coming back soon."

Lukas pat him on the back before walking down the hall, looking between Emil and Matthias' doors, then sighing, knocking on Matthias'.

"Matthias?"

The other man still stood in the living room, seeming frozen in place for a few moments, before finally walking away, towards his room.

He didn't shut his door, because God knew there had been too many doors shut today.

*

The box sat unopened on Berwald's desk.

Someone was knocking at the front door, even though it was around midnight, and the entire house was fast asleep. Berwald opened his eyes once again and reached over to put on his glasses. However, his glasses were already on. In fact, he wasn't even in his bed, he was still at his desk, one hand on top of the box. His throat was parched, and he coughed, sitting up. Sure enough, the clock read 11:57 PM, and he sighed.

He pushed away from the desk, stood up, and walked out of his room to get a glass of water. Finally, he went down the hall to the front door, which was closed and locked. He opened the door slowly and looked at the person that was standing on the doorstep.

The water glass fell onto the porch, spilling cold water, shattering into a million different shards.

_His face..._

He was crying. Those beautiful eyes had filled with tears as soon as he saw Berwald, and not from fear, for once.

Matthias came up behind the Swedish man, yawning.

"Berwald? What's all the noi-" Then he stopped and stared at the man on the doorstep.

"T-Tino...?"


	4. Chapter 4

Berwald stood stone still.

His soulmate was right in front of him. The soulmate he had seen in the clouds for years since he was born. The soulmate that he had forgotten and had only just learned the name of...

The one named Tino.

There were no words needed here.

Tino ran up and hugged both Berwald and Matthias. Matthias hugged Tino back, but Berwald just stood. He didn't know what to do.

"You need to stop being so loud," Emil said, walking past the doorway, until he saw Tino. He walked over, and when Matthias pulled him into the hug, he didn't object.

Lukas followed, face thoughtful. "It's good to see you, Tino."

Tino hugged Berwald tighter, his tears staining the taller man's clothes. "I missed you so much!" A little white puppy wiggled around their feet, and Tino let go and picked the puppy up. "You remember Hanatamago, don't you?"

"He doesn't remember anything, Tino," Matthias said, a rueful smile on his face.

Tino held the puppy closer. "What?" He looked over at Lukas and Emil, who both nodded. Emil stared at the the ground, while Lukas stared at nothing.

Berwald took a deep breath and looked down at Hanatamago, who looked up at him, panting.

Tino's eyes widened. "You mean...he doesn't remember anything?"

Silence.

"Why?"

"Ivan took you away."

Tino sighed and looked up at Berwald. "Th-that's alright. It's nice seeing you again."

Berwald awkwardly hugged him, and the puppy squirmed, trying to get out of Tino's arms. Tino gave him a weak smile and set down Hanatamago, following the group into the house. The white puppy ran inside, eagerly going over to her food dish, which was still sitting in the same spot, and pawing at it.

"No, Hana," Tino said, shaking his head. "Eduard already gave you supper."

"You look really tired, anyway," Matthias said, rubbing his eyes. "Do you want to sleep with Berwald or in the guest room?"

Berwald tensed up and turned to Tino for what seemed like the hundredth time in the four minutes since he had arrived. Tino looked up at him and grinned. "I've waited long enough. Besides, I'm sure spending one night with me will help!"

Berwald hesitated, then said quietly, "Thank you."

Tino's smile was as beautiful as the sunshine to Berwald. And that beautiful smile grew still larger.

Matthias was smiling too, clearly happy to see his friend again. Emil and Lukas were happy too, even though they didn't really show it.

"Also, we can clean up the glass tomorrow!" The Dane walked past them after hugging all of them-even Emil and Lukas-once again and shutting the door to his room, which Lukas opened seconds later, before slamming it closed behind them both.

Emil clenched and unclenched his fingers for a few seconds, then said, "Goodnight," before walking into his room, the one he usually shared with Lukas.

Berwald and Tino walked to the end of the hall, where their room was, and Berwald nervously twisted the ring around his finger. "Berwald, you didn't really forget everything, did you?"

Berwald nodded. "I did."

"Then, you cared about me a lot," Tino said, laying down in bed, yawning.

Berwald awkwardly laid down next to him and stared with light blue eyes at the ceiling.

Hanatamago jumped on the bed and curled up between them, falling asleep almost immediately.

Berwald took off his glasses, setting them on the nightstand.

However, neither of them were able to sleep.

Matthias and Lukas were asleep, however, just down the hall.

Emil was still awake in his room, holding Mr. Puffin in his lap, staring at the wall, trying to forget about Lukas, just like Berwald had forgotten about Tino.

 

*

"Berwald!"

Berwald opened his eyes and stared up at the ceiling.

He couldn't believe he had actually been able to sleep. Last night had been extremely awkward for him, telling the person that he had once so dearly loved that he didn't remember anything about him.

And then, something pounced on his stomach. This was followed by laughter and someone yelling,"Hana, get off!"

_Oh, right._

Berwald sat up and looked down at the white ball of fluff on his stomach, reaching down to pat the dog's head. He raised his eyes and looked to see Tino sitting cross-legged beside him.

"Good morning!" Tino said, smiling wider.

Berwald reached over to get his glasses and put them on, sighing as everything finally became clear. Whoa. Tino looked even more beautiful in the morning than he had the night before. His hair looked like spun gold, and his eyes sparkled with a million stars."Morning," he said, giving Tino a small smile.

Fragments of memories had been in his dreams the night before, but he only saw places, not moments in time.

Tino hugged him again, then stood up, opening the door and walking out of the bedroom.

Berwald sat there, massaging his temples. It felt really weird now that Tino was here, especially since he only realized he had existed a couple of days ago.

Even so, he was afraid of letting Tino go again.


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yay! More slamming doors!  
> And Matthias being drunk!  
> Will wonders never cease?  
> Hahaha, note the sarcasm.

Matthias stayed home the entire day, true to his words.

Berwald hadn't been allowed by his friends to work since he'd lost his memory, afraid for his mental state. They acted like he had Alzheimer's or something, and it had always gotten on his nerves.

Emil was at his appointment, Lukas was who knows where, probably "talking to trolls" (Berwald was pretty sure LUKAS was the one they should have been worried about), and Tino was sitting right beside him, Hana in his lap.

Tino was the most beautiful person he had ever seen, but hadn't even mentioned the box (which Berwald still hadn't opened...).

He did seem nervous, however, and started to tell some stories about what had happened while he was with Ivan. He told them about the five people that lived with him, Eduard, Raivis, Toris, Natalya, and Katyusha. He told them mostly about Eduard, who had apparently been a really good friend to Tino. However, Eduard, Raivis, and Toris had all seemed really scared of Ivan in most of Tino's stories.

"So, what did Ivan do to them to make them all scared?" Matthias said, setting down the mug of beer he'd been drinking.

Tino looked uncomfortable, but mumbled,"I don't know..."

That was a red flag for Berwald, and he tensed up, turning to look at Tino, who was suddenly silent.

Matthias laughed. "He probably...ate their pirozhki or something..."

There was no way in Hell that man was sober, Berwald decided. "That's enough to drink," he said, standing up and taking away Matthias' beer.

Matthias crossed his arms. "Gilbert always says that drinking makes people more awesome!"

Hana jumped out of Tino's lap. Berwald set the beer down on the kitchen table, then walked back into the other room, sitting back down next to Tino, who looked shaken.

Suddenly, Lukas walked in. The cell phone clip in his hair was about to fall out, and he was carrying a small black book with a purple pentagram on it.

"Lukas, what's-"

"Someone gave it to me," Lukas said, interrupting Tino's question.

"Who?"

"Some man with a dumb name. It was Arnold, or something, I don't know." Lukas threw it onto the bed in his room and sat down next to Matthias, who fell onto his lap, closing his eyes. "Is he drunk again?" Lukas asked, sighing.

Tino nodded.

Lukas shook his head disapprovingly, then looked back down at Matthias, combing his fingers in his blonde hair. "So tangled."

Berwald was quite aware of the tension in the room from both sides. There was a perfectly functional couple, and then on his side...

"Berwald, do you want to spend some time outside?" Lukas said, seeing right into his current anxieties.

Berwald nodded.

Tino stood up. "I'll come with you."

*

"So, this was where you found the ring?"

Berwald and Tino stood in front of the carrot where the ring had been, and Berwald twisted the ring around so the sapphire was touching his palm. He nodded, smiling a bit.

Tino stared at it for a moment before turning to see the violet flowers Berwald had been admiring the day before. "You still have these?" He asked, kneeling down to look at them.

"Yes," Berwald answered, raising his eyebrows at Tino.

"You always said that they reminded you of my eyes," Tino laughed, turning to look at Berwald, smiling.

The taller blonde tapped his chin and looked from the flowers to Tino. "They do." Tino picked the flower and handed it to Berwald, who put it behind his soulmates ear. Tino's face was tinged pink, and he smiled wider, taking the Swedish man's hand and pulling him over to a tree, where he sat down. Berwald sat down next to him, pushing his glasses back onto his nose.

"Did you like what was in the box?"

Berwald pursed his lips, because he hadn't opened it, no matter how many times he tried.

Tino noticed Berwald's hesitance to answer and his smile faded. "You did open it, right?"

Berwald shook his head.

"Why not?"

"I couldn't."

Tino gritted his teeth. "W-well, you would've liked it. Do you want to go inside and open it now?"

"I don't know," he answered, rubbing his temples.

His soulmate gave him a small smile. "It's all right. So, how have things been here?"

Berwald shrugged. "Okay."

"Um, what about Matthias, Lukas, and Emil? Is anything going on with them?"

"Emil is getting a blood test today to see if Lukas is his older brother."

"Why does he need to know that?"

"His soulmate is Lukas," Berwald said, looking up at the leaves of the tree. A bird circled overhead, tilting its wings to catch the wind.

"Oh."

And that was the last thing Tino said the rest of the afternoon, until Emil came home.

*

Emil didn't look too happy when he walked in the house.

When he walked in, he walked all the way through the house and down the hall where their bedrooms were, slamming his door shut.

Lukas frowned and stood up, walking over to Emil's door, knocking on it softly, "Emil?"

Matthias had kind of sobered up, but still wasn't showing any negative emotion to Emil in regards to the day before. Berwald had too much going on to worry too much about it, though.

There was no answer from Emil, so Lukas cracked open the door, looking inside.

Emil was, once again, sitting on his bed, holding the puffin stuffed animal in his arms, face buried in it. "Go away," he grumbled.

Berwald, Matthias, and Tino, who had been watching this from down the hall, walked over to the door to stand next to Lukas, who was starting to look really concerned. "Ice?"

Lukas, when he was really worried about Emil, called him "Ice", since he had lived in Iceland for almost his whole life.

When Lukas used the nickname, they knew something was definitely wrong.

"Ice, may I come in?"

Emil let out a muffled response, due to his face being smashed into Mr. Puffin's head.

Lukas came in anyway, and so did Berwald, Tino, and Matthias, who was completely sober now.

"You're my brother," Emil grumbled, glaring up at Lukas.

Lukas crossed his arms. "Why is that sad?"

"They're gonna kill you, first off, because we-"

Lukas cut him off, pointing at Matthias and shaking his head.

Emil seemed to get the message (whatever message it was) and shut up.

"He's mad because now he has to call me Big Brother, like he did when I first met him," Lukas explained.

Matthias' eyes lit up. "Really?" He turned to Emil. "Hey, can you call me Big Brother, too?"

Emil looked startled, but then went along with what Lukas was trying to do. "I'm not calling either of you Big Brother."

Lukas took Mr. Puffin out of Emil's hands and used the corners of his sleeves to wipe away his brother's tears. "You don't have to cry, Ice," he said, a small smile crossing his face.

Berwald stared at Lukas, who he had never, ever seen smile. Yet he was smiling now, and he felt Tino's surprise from next to him.

"Now say it, 'Big Brother'."

"I'm not saying it."

"Big Brother."

"No!"

"Big Brother."

Emil snatched Mr. Puffin back and glared at Lukas, who looked completely serious. "I'm not calling you 'Big Brother'!"

Lukas crossed his arms and glared at him.

"NO!" Emil yelled, facepalming, then walking out of the room.

There was a pause.

Then, "Big brother."

Emil gave them a thumbs-up through the doorway, before turning it upside down and walking away.

Everyone was silent for a few more moments before Matthias said,"Well, that was fun."

Lukas looked down at his nails before sitting back down on Emil's bed, looking around the room. Emil's room was dark, the curtains were drawn, and Christmas lights were strung around the room, splashes of color on the floor.

Berwald rubbed the ring, looking back at Tino, who was looking around at the Christmas lights. "Are these mine?" Tino asked, looking at Lukas, who nodded.

Matthias turned to Tino, grinning. "So what do you want for dinner?"

"I want Berwald's food," Tino said, looking over at his soulmate, who froze up immediately, blue eyes wide.

"Huh?"


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Wow, baby Emil is really cute XD  
> Also, Matthias is a happy puppy when it comes to snow, apparently -_-

Another night without Lukas.

Emil couldn't get to sleep.

He knew Lukas did love Matthias, no matter how hard he tried to hide it, and that Matthias loved him back. Besides, it wasn't like Emil knew anything about love. So what if it felt like Lukas was the home where his heart truly was? Emil could never live up to anyone's expectations, much less his brother's.

Much, _much_ less his brother's.

Ivan treated him well, of course. So did Lukas, Berwald, Tino, and Matthias. So did that mysterious Asian boy that he had seen in the clouds exactly once, or at least in some of his most depressing dreams.

Mr. Puffin couldn't talk, of course, but Emil liked to tell him about things that he couldn't tell anyone else, like the fact that he and Ivan were friends...Emil was highly suspicious of the Russian, however, and tried not to get too tangled up with him if he could help it.

The Icelander sighed and rolled over face-down into his pillow, willing the tears welling in his eyes to go away. Lukas and Matthias were across the hall, doing who knew what, and Berwald and Tino were down the hall, asleep. He realized he was alone. He could cry all he wanted, now.

The first few tears slipped down his face, and he squeezed the puffin stuffed animal, burying his face in its fuzzy exterior.

Someone knocked on the door, then, and it was Lukas who opened the door.

"Ice?"

Emil tried to stop crying, but the tears came faster, dripping down his face and off his chin. Lukas sat down and looked Emil right in the eye, eyes concerned. "Are you all right?"

Emil nodded.

"No, you're not." Lukas said, using the corner of his sleeve to wipe off the tears running down his brother's face.

Emil stared at Lukas with purple eyes and threw his arms around him after a moment's hesitation, holding him close.

Lukas stared down at Emil, whose tears were staining his nightshirt. With a soft smile, he gently hugged him back, closing his eyes.

Moments later, Emil had cried himself to sleep, and Lukas was so touched by his little brother's behavior that he had to stay with him.

*

_Lukas was sitting on the grass, looking up at the Northern Lights._

_The small, silver-haired boy sitting next to him tugged on his sleeve, frowning. "Big Brother, pick me up."_

_Lukas looked down at him, startled. He hadn't noticed the boy until now. "Why?"_

_The boy looked up at the sky, reaching up to the lights. "I wanna touch the snakes!"_

_"Those aren't snakes," Lukas said, amused. "They're the Northern Lights."_

_"I still wanna touch them!"_

_Lukas looked down at the boy, who he didn't even know. "Where are your parents?"_

_"I don't know," the boy answered. "But you look like my big brother I think so I'm gonna stay with you so you can help me find them."_

_Lukas nodded. "Okay. What's your name?"_

_"Em-Emil?" The boy shrugged. "I don't know. I think that's my name."_

_He couldn't have been more than five years old. Lukas was only eight, but knew that the child would probably die if he kept wandering around alone._

_"Okay, Emil. I'm Lukas."_

_Lukas picked up the boy and the boy reached up to touch the lights, but couldn't. "Why can't I touch them?" Emil pouted as Lukas set him back down._

_"They're too high up," Lukas said, tapping his chin. "But maybe one day we'll both be tall enough."_

_Emil pursed his lips, then tugged on Lukas' sleeve again. "Big Brother Lukas, can you promise me? That one day we'll be able to touch the Magical Northern Snakes?"_

_Lukas thought for a moment, then nodded. "Yes," he said, patting Emil's head. "But they're not 'Magical Northern Snakes', they're the Northern Lights..."_

_Emil reached up and squeezed Lukas' hand. "Thank you, Big Brother!"_

_Lukas squeezed Emil's hand back. "You're welcome."_

*

"SNOW!"

That was how Berwald, Tino, and the rest of the inhabitants of the house had woken up.

Matthias was skipping through the house, cheering loudly.

Tino hid under the covers, covering his ears.

Berwald put on his glasses and stood up, walking up to the Dane as he made his third round around the house, and gripped his shoulder firmly, narrowing his eyes.

Matthias looked up at him for a moment, before shoving his hand off his shoulder, continuing to parade around, singing loudly and horribly about the weather outside.

Berwald was surprised that Emil and Lukas weren't up already, telling him to shut up. In fact, Emil's door was still closed, when he checked.

When he got back to his and Tino's room, Tino was still hiding under the covers, and Hana was hiding under the bed, covering her ears with her paws.

The Swede walked over to his soulmate and lifted up the sheets, looking at him. Tino had a disgruntled expression on his face. "Well, one thing hasn't changed," he said, uncovering his ears as the sound of a door opening and closing signified that Matthias had now gone outside to continue his parade.

Emil's door was still closed, but shuffling sounds were coming from inside.

Tino raised his eyebrows at Emil's door. "Lukas and Emil share a room now?"

Berwald shrugged. "Lukas doesn't have a room."

"Does Matthias still want to live in a house made of Legos?"

"Yes."

Tino laughed. "Why would anyone want to live in a house of Legos?"

"I want to live in a furniture store," Berwald said, quietly.

The shorter blonde shrugged. "Hm, I guess a house of Legos isn't really weird, then, compared to that."

Berwald missed the fact that Tino had just insulted him. He shrugged once again.

Tino stood up and stretched, before giving his soulmate a hug. Berwald twisted the ring violently around his finger and stiffly hugged him back.

After a few moments, Tino let go, and Berwald hesitantly let go of him as well. He bent down and kissed the top of his soulmate's head, before smoothing down his hair and walking out to the kitchen once again.

Sure enough, it had snowed a lot. Matthias was building a snowman outside, and he kept pushing the middle part of the snowman around, trying to make it bigger and bigger.

Berwald pinched the bridge of his nose and sighed. Of course, the Dane was hardly wearing any clothes except the ones he had slept in.

Suddenly, Emil's door opened, and Lukas stepped out, blinking at Berwald and Tino, who stared at him quizzically. He walked past them, then walked over to the back door. "Getting excited about snow and ice?" he grumbled to himself, opening it. "What are you, a dog?"

Tino laughed. Berwald looked down at Tino, who smiled up at him. "Wasn't that a good joke, Berwald?"

"...I guess."

Emil walked into the kitchen then, rubbing his eyes, sighing.

"Hey, how did you sleep?" Tino asked, walking up beside him.

The teenager shrugged. "I dunno. Well, I guess?"

"That's good! Berwald and I slept well too!" Tino said, hugging Berwald. "I hope my friends at Mr. Braginsky's house are okay!"

"Why wouldn't they be okay?" Emil said, raising his eyebrows.

"They all seem scared of him, like I said."

Berwald sighed. "They probably have a reason for that."

"Mr. Braginsky was nice to me, though. I mean, Toris had scars from something, but-"

"Toris had scars?"

"He showed me one night and said it was from Mr. Braginsky, but I didn't believe him."

Emil raised his eyebrows. "Why wouldn't you believe him? Ivan basically kidnapped you."

Tino tried to think of a good response, but couldn't. "W-well..."

"You should trust Toris more than Ivan."

"B-but Mr. Braginsky's sisters seem to love him!"

Emil crossed his arms. "Then they're all wicked. Why are Toris, Raivis, and Eduard even there?"

Tino shut his mouth after that, and didn't even talk while they were eating breakfast. Emil, on the other hand, seemed to be in a bad mood for the rest of the day and wouldn't talk to anyone except Berwald.

Outside, Matthias was still building the snowman, and the snow was still falling. Lukas seemed to be talking to himself.

Berwald looked at the flower Tino had put in the middle of the table yesterday as a centerpiece. It was wilting, its stem turning brown. _Does it need more water?_

Tino grabbed a small cup and filled it with water, then filled the flower's jar with it. "There!" he said, smiling.

Emil still didn't look very happy, and walked into his room, grabbed Mr. Puffin, sitting down at the kitchen table, staring at the flower. "What kind of flower is that?"

No answer.

Matthias started waving at them through the window. "HEY! LOOK AT THIS!" He pointed behind him at the giant snowman he had built, just as the head fell off. "Oh..."

Though they could only see Lukas' back, it looked like he was laughing.

Berwald turned to Tino, right as he dashed over to the door and went outside to join Matthias.

Emil stared after him, then caught Berwald watching and looked up at the taller man. "What?"

"You seemed pretty angry about Ivan," Berwald said, raising his eyebrows at Emil, who recoiled immediately. Hanatamago ran out of Berwald and Tino's room, running right into the door. Berwald opened the door for the dog, and she ran outside, barking playfully. The Swede then turned back to Emil. "Why?"

"Well, he's an acquaintance, I guess," Emil said, looking down at his feet. "I mean, we're not best friends or anything, but-"

"You're friends with the man that stole my wife?"

"...Your wife...?"

Berwald pointed outside at Tino.

"Oh..."

 

 


	7. Chapter 7

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Oh no, more tears!

Berwald was relieved when Tino wanted to go to sleep.

The entire day had been tiring. Matthias had played in the snow for too long without proper clothing and got sick, Lukas was looking through the weird black book he had gotten from the strange man for a cure, Emil seemed tense (especially around Tino), and Tino had insisted Berwald help him build a snowman, which Berwald hadn't done before and was secretly terrified that they were stepping all over his plants.

Now that Tino was back, Berwald had thought all his memories would have been back. But they weren't. Maybe they were gone for good.

Tino seemed distant when Berwald shut the door to their room. True, it had been a long day. However, something had seemed off with Tino since they had had that conversation about Ivan with Emil.

Emil had said he and Ivan were acquaintances after the fact. Then he had shut up immediately, not talking to anyone except for Lukas the rest of the day.

Berwald narrowed his eyes at Tino, who immediately froze up, looking nervous. "Wh-what? Is something wrong?"

"Seems so."

Tino fidgeted with the sheets. "What's wrong?"

Berwald shrugged as he sat down next to him.

"Then why-"

"You seem tense," the Swede said, staring at his soulmate with such intensity that the latter thought he was going to melt.

"Well, that conversation we had with Emil. He seemed shocked when I said that Toris had scars from Mr. Braginsky-"

"Why don't you call him Ivan?"

"B-Because, that's rude! He never said I could call him by his first name!" Tino said, frowning.

Berwald took his glasses off. "What happened to get you there in the first place?"

Tino shook his head. "You'd be better off not knowing that, Berwald." He stood up and walked over to Berwald's desk. "Is this desk new?"

"Yes," Berwald said, standing up and walking over to his desk, setting a hand on it.

"Have you made anything else?"

"They don't let me work."

"What?" Tino wondered aloud, frowning. "Why-? Oh, look! It's the box!" The Finnish man picked up the cardboard box Berwald still hadn't opened. "Do you want to open it now?"

Berwald let Tino drop it in his hands and looked down at it. He had cut open the tape sealing it closed but hadn't looked inside. He slowly held it up to his face and opened it, looking inside. "There's nothing inside..."

Tino frowned. "What?" He took it from Berwald, looking inside, shaking it. "Oh, here it is!" A small flower dropped into his hand, and he held it out for Berwald. "I saw these flowers and they reminded me of you." The flower was teal, almost exactly the color of Berwald's eyes. "I mean, I guess it doesn't matter much now, but I still wanted you to see them."

Berwald felt his heart melt just staring at the flowers and turned to Tino, who still looked nervous. "Thank you."

Tino smiled. "You like them?"

The taller of the two nodded and hugged his soulmate, and Tino hugged him back, still gripping the cardboard box in his hand.

However, when Tino tried to pull away, his soulmate still held him tight, breathing heavily. "B-Berwald? What's-" and then, with a shuddering breath, Berwald let him go, covering his face with his hands.

Berwald was crying.

"Berwald?"

"S-sorry 'bout that," Berwald said, voice shaking.

"What's wrong?"

"I-Ivan."

"H-hey, it's okay!" Tino said, breath quickening. "C-can you calm down? You're scaring me."

Berwald pinched the bridge of his nose and tried to breathe, but started coughing instead.

"You didn't let me go to Mr. Braginsky, Berwald. Don't blame yourself for any of it, okay?" Tino squeezed Berwald's hand. "And I'm here now, okay? So everything will be fine, I promise."

"It won't," Berwald said, blinking away tears.

"Why?" Tino said, frowning. "I'm here now. There's nothing for you to worry about!"

"What if he comes back for you?"

Tino froze, then said in a quiet voice,"Do you think that's possible?"

Berwald shrugged, and the fact that Tino looked worried now definitely didn't help his mood.

"H-he might, since...I wasn't even supposed to leave that place..."

"How'd you leave?"

"Eduard," Tino said, fidgeting nervously. "He drove me here. Oh, what if Mr. Braginsky finds out it was him and he hurts him?!"

Tino grew more and more nervous as the seconds passed, to the point where he was almost crying. Berwald wanted to step in, but didn't know the best way to do so. The Finnish man had his lips pursed together, and he held Berwald's hand in a vice.

The Swede didn't want to see Tino cry. Having thought of what to do, he pulled something out from underneath the bed. It was a wooden chest, with a latch. Inside the chest were toys meant for a young child, made out of wood. He pulled out a small wooden wolf and handed it to his soulmate.

Tino looked down at the toy in his hand and sniffed, rubbing his eyes. "Hey, did you make this, Berwald?"

Berwald nodded, taking a few more of the toys and setting them on the bed next to Tino.

"They're amazing!" Tino said, setting down the wolf and picking up a horse.

"Thanks."

"Do you feel better now?"

Berwald nodded, a small smile crossing his face. The rest of the tears on his face slowly dripped off.

They suddenly heard scratching at the door and loud sniffing and whimpering. Tino chuckled. "Guess I forgot to let Hana in..." He walked over and opened the door, and Hanatamago ran in, jumping on the bed, almost knocking over the wooden figures.

Berwald started to put the figures away, but Tino kept a small dog in his hands. "Leave them out, Berwald, I like them!"

The tall, quiet man sighed, carrying the chest over to the desk and setting out all of the animals on top of it. Hana snuggled down beside Tino, who was laying down, curled up in the sheets, eyes already closed. The wooden dog was set on the nightstand, in front of the clock.

Berwald hoped neither of them would have to cry like that again.

He promised himself he would never make anyone-including himself-cry, ever again.

 


	8. Chapter 8

Tino woke up early that morning. The sky was dark, as it usually was in Denmark.

He remembered the midnight suns he had seen with Ivan and his "family".

Having heard himself, he looked around, realizing he was more alone than he had been in a long while.

Sure, Berwald had his arms around him, but he was asleep. Hanatamago slept between them, her head resting on her paws.

Tino sat up, and Berwald's arms fell off of him. He needed water. Berwald usually kept a cup of water next to his bed all the time, so he looked over at the nightstand. The glowing green numbers on the clock blinked. Berwald's alarm must have already gone off, but only Tino had heard it. Looking down at his soulmate, he saw the dark circles under his eyes and frowned. _Berwald must be stressed out_ , he decided. He stood up and looked around the the room for a cup of water, but it seemed there wasn't one.

He opened the door quietly and stepped out, walking to the kitchen.

Someone was talking. It sounded like Emil, so he kept walking into the kitchen, staring at the ground. He didn't want to anger Emil any more by acknowledging that he was awake, until he heard another voice speaking.

He looked up at Emil, who was leaning out the kitchen window, his hair dancing in the wind that was blowing inside.

And outside was Ivan Braginsky.

Emil didn't seem to notice Tino, and neither did Ivan.

Tino suddenly felt large hands on his shoulders and squealed, turning around abruptly.

Berwald stared at him, his eyes wide. "What're you up for?"

"B-because-" Tino pointed at Emil, who somehow still hadn't noticed him.

Berwald froze up. "S'that Ivan?"

Tino nodded, rocking on his feet. "I don't know why he's here, but I think-"

"Emil's his friend."

"Oh?"

Berwald nodded.

Tino couldn't imagine Ivan and Emil as friends, but shrugged. "D-do you think they would mind if I got some water?"

"No. But just in case, I'm coming with you," Berwald sighed, rubbing his eyes. He wasn't wearing his glasses, and Tino smiled. Berwald's vision was crap, but he looked beautiful without glasses.

They stepped into the kitchen, and Tino half expected a floorboard to creak when he stepped on it, like in the movies-but thankfully, the floorboards didn't creak. He grabbed the water glass and filled it up with water, then stepped back over to the doorway.

Right as he almost got to the door, Ivan said, "Oh, hello, Tino."

Tino froze.

"Why are you here, instead of my home?" Ivan said, a terrifyingly calm smile on his face. "And where is Eduard? You didn't...do something to him, da?"

Emil stepped away from the window, face turning red. "Tino, you shouldn't be here!"

Tino started to step forward, but Berwald set a hand on his shoulder, staring straight ahead at Ivan. He strode towards the open kitchen window and leaned out, glaring at Ivan.

"Ah, is this your soulmate, Tino?" Ivan said, still smiling, though the smile didn't reach his eyes. Then he narrowed his eyes. "Mine left years ago and still hasn't come back to me."

"Uh, pardon me, Mr. Braginsky, but who is your soulmate?" Tino piped up, from behind Berwald.

"Matthew Williams."

"Matthew Williams?" Lukas asked, from behind them. "I know him. Arthur talked about him."

Ivan sighed and looked over at Lukas. "Does your friend know where Matthew is?"

Lukas rubbed his arm, frowning. "I think he said Matthew died a few years ago in a car crash."

The Russian's eyes widened. In barely a whisper, he said,"Matvey's...dead?"

Lukas nodded.

Berwald suddenly felt pity for the man and stepped back from the window.

"I shouldn't have come here. I'm sorry." Ivan's eyes were filled with tears, and he walked away before they could see him cry.

"Mr. Braginsky..."

Tino looked after Ivan, who didn't look back. Berwald set a hand on Tino's shoulder and pulled him away from the window, sighing.

"I don't think he came here just to ask where Eduard was." Emil said.

Matthias turned and glared at Emil, arms crossed. "Ha, it seems funny, though, that you two were having a civilized conversation. With Ivan."

"What's so wrong with that?" 

"Oh, nothing, except for the face that your 'best pal' fucking KIDNAPPED Tino!" 

Emil stared at him, then rolled his eyes. "You're so annoying, Matthias."

"I'M annoying? You should listen to yourself!"

"EVERYONE JUST BE QUIET!"

Everyone stared at Tino in silence, eyes wide. Tino looked like he was about to murder someone at this point. Lukas was emotionless. Emil still looked angry. Matthias' eyes were wide in shock, his mouth hanging open. And Berwald was wondering how his sweet little soulmate had suddenly turned into this homicidal... _thing_.

Tino coughed and smiled sweetly, then. "Thank you."

Everyone stared at him for at least another minute. Then Matthias sighed. "Let's just go to sleep."

"Suit yourself," Emil grumbled, crossing his arms. "I won't be able to go to sleep because of your _annoying_ snoring."

Matthias looked like he wanted to punch the teenager, but sighed and decided against it. "Okay," he sighed, raising his hands up in the air and walking away. "Okay!"

*

The next day, Berwald was out in the garden, watering the purple flowers, which Ivan had clearly stepped on. He sighed and lifted up one of the flowers.

He heard the back door shut, and Tino walked out of the house, standing behind Berwald, watching as he kept trying to stand the flowers back up.

"Berwald, it's okay," Tino said, smiling. "We can just get new ones. That's not going to work."

Berwald sighed once again. "Right," he muttered, stepping back from the purple flowers. He looked up at the sky and saw Tino's face, and, smiling a little, stood up. "Thank you."

Tino smiled back at him. "Sure."

There was still snow outside, but it had not accumulated higher than the flowers.

Large footprints were everywhere, though it seemed as though whoever had made them had stepped inside his own footprints while he was leaving. They led out to the street, but didn't stop there.

Berwald raised his eyebrows but didn't give them much thought. He didn't really want to remember Ivan's visit the night before.

"I feel kind of bad for Mr. Braginsky, don't you?"


	9. Chapter 9

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Oof, this chapter's more about Mattie and his relationship with Ivan.   
> I feel bad for both of them.

Matthew Williams disappeared without a trace.

When they sent the bloodhounds for him, no bloodhounds found him.

No one, not even his stepbrother, knew exactly what happened to him.

They used the car crash as a cover-up, since no one knew whether he was alive or dead. And so, everyone was in the dark on what truly had happened.

Someone had murdered him.

No one pointed fingers at Ivan Braginsky for it, though that's what had happened.

Ivan was mentally unstable. At that time, nobody except the doctors and the people living with him knew that. Not even Ivan knew. He just did what the doctors told him to do: to take his pills every morning and every night.

Matthew had just started living with Ivan and was particularly quiet, not doing much. He didn't talk to the other people that lived with Ivan, as he was pretty nervous around them, but the feeling was mutual. They didn't seem to understand how Ivan, of all people, could have a soulmate-so they figured Matthew had to be the same as Ivan sanity-wise.

Ivan loved Matthew more than anything in the world, and Matthew loved him too.

However, Ivan quickly noticed that Matthew was fearful of him, even though he plastered on fake smiles to keep Ivan happy. Unfortunately, his soulmate could clearly see through his masks and quickly realized something was troubling him.

One night, he confronted him about it.

Matthew answered quite simply. "The other people here...they seem scared of you. Why?"

Ivan told him he had no idea.

"Why do you take those pills?"

Ivan told him, once again, that he had no idea why.

The night after that, Matthew was reading in his room, the stuffed bear Ivan had bought him named Kumajirou in his lap.

And then, before he knew it, a pipe whacked him in the back of the head, knocking him out cold, and he never woke up.

Ivan didn't know what had happened.

Toris, Raivis, and Eduard did, however.

The next morning, they had walked in, carrying Ivan and Matthew's breakfast, and found Matthew's limp form on the floor, cold. His glasses were broken, and glass covered the floor.

Ivan wasn't there, but the metal pipe was.

They decided not to tell Ivan. Ivan would probably kill himself if he had known what he had done to Matthew, his beautiful sunflower.

Eduard buried Matthew under a tree outside Ivan's house in the freezing cold.

"Where is Matthew?"

He asked that question every day, for five years.

The answer was always the same.

"He left."

And then, he met Tino.

Tino was a young man only a bit older than Matthew had been. He had pretty blonde hair and purple eyes, just like Matthew's.

Ivan thought Tino was Matthew at first.

But he wasn't, he quickly discovered. They were entirely different. Of course, he only discovered that after he had kidnapped Tino and stolen him from his home, forcing the Finnish man to live with him.

Still, Tino was fun to be around. He liked telling jokes and talking about what had happened while he was at Mr. Køhler's house, about Lukas and Emil and Matthias, and most of all, his soulmate, Berwald.

Ivan was jealous of Berwald for having such an amazing person as his soulmate.

He wished Matthew had been a better soulmate and hadn't just left him, like everyone said he did.

Which he hadn't.

Ivan truly didn't know how violent he was when he didn't take his pills. He didn't know what happened to him. He didn't know about how cruel he was.

He could never hurt someone, unless they were hurting someone he cared about.

Or at least, that's what he believed.

*

There was nothing wrong with Matthew Williams.

He had grown up with his stepbrother Alfred in a nice house with a nice family. He saw Ivan's face in the clouds every single day, and he studied every face he saw carefully, closely, trying to find his soulmate.

When he found him, he was at a flower garden. A tall man was sitting on a bench, watching the sunflowers sway in the wind, tapping his fingers on his legs. He was alone, and no one else seemed to notice him-in fact, everyone seemed to be avoiding him.

The man was wearing heavy clothes for the warm weather, and Matthew was confused at this.

Then he did a double take and stared at the man's face.

The man noticed him staring at him and turned. "Hello."

Matthew tapped his fingers together and nodded at him.

"Have we met before?" The man said, standing up and walking over to the Canadian. He tilted his head and narrowed his eyes, not losing the slight smile on his face.

_He's so close._

It was definitely him.

Matthew wasn't sure he liked him. "You're my soulmate, right?"

"Ivan Braginsky," he said, holding out his hand.

Matthew hesitantly took it. "Matthew Williams."

Ivan walked over to the sunflowers and picked one, handing it to Matthew. "You like sunflowers, da?"

Matthew looked down at the flower, then back up at Ivan, who looked hopeful, and nodded. "Thank you."

"You're coming with me," Ivan said, grabbing his wrist with an iron grip.

"H-hey! Where are you taking me?"

"Home, of course, Matvey. Where else?"

The Canadian was enraged. Even though he had had a good life, people tended not to notice him. And if they did notice him, they either thought he was his stepbrother, who looked just like him, or pulled him around behind them.

Ivan had been the fourteenth person to drag him somewhere that day. Matthew sighed and let him, not even bothering to call out to Alfred, who was halfway across the garden, talking to his soulmate, Arthur Kirkland.

He didn't believe that the Russian was supposed to be his soulmate, until after a few weeks of living with him.

Unfortunately, he didn't find out about the pills until it was too late.

*

In Matthias' house, no one else slept for the rest of the night.

Neither did Ivan, or anyone that lived with him.

He stayed up crying for the rest of the night, trying to drown himself in vodka. Finally, his older sister came in and took the bottles of vodka away.

Tino didn't know about Ivan's problems, even after years of living with him.

But he did know what it was like to lose one's soulmate.


	10. Chapter 10

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Berwald needs to realize Tino isn't a fragile little flower like he thinks he is   
> -_-   
> Also, Tino needs to stop spending time with Matthias.

The next day, Berwald woke early.

The snow had almost melted completely, and bits of grass poked through the frozen ground.

True to his word, Tino went with him to buy more flowers, then took Hanatamago for a walk, talking once again about Ivan.

"He let me decorate my room the way I wanted," he said, reaching down to scratch Hana's head.

Berwald nodded. Even though he didn't really want to talk about Ivan, he liked hearing Tino's stories, so he didn't interrupt.

"It was black, with skulls and chains everywhere."

The Swede took one good look at Tino, who smiled up at him, then looked back at the horizon, frowning. "Why'd you make it like that?"

"B-because it looks cool!" Tino said, smile faltering. "Doesn't it sound cool?"

"Hm."

Tino looked down at Hana, who looked back up at him, panting.

Berwald looked down at the dog too. "Where'd she come from?"

"Oh, Hana?" Tino asked, immediately smiling again. "We found her in our yard one day, and I wanted to name her things like 'Blood-Covered Flower Egg', but you seemed really freaked out by those names, for some reason. So we just settled on Flower Egg! Oh, and Hanatamago means Flower Egg, it's much easier to say, don't you think?"

Berwald knelt down next to Hana, who jumped at him, landing in his arms. A rare smile crossed his face and he scratched the dog's head, closing his eyes as she reached up to lick his face.

"Aw! Ber, she loves you!" Tino smiled, trying to pull Hana off of him.

_Ber?_

Berwald looked up at Tino, then looked up at the sky, where Tino's face was as well. "Why'd you call me 'Ber'?"

"That's your nickname." The Finnish man finally managed to pull Hanatamago off of his soulmate, holding her tightly in his arms. "Do you like it?"

Berwald nodded.

"Good," Tino beamed, ruffling Berwald's hair. "Let's continue on our journey, shall we?" he said. He set the dog in his arms down and stood up, pointing forwards with his index. "Onwards, Blood-Covered Flower Egg!"

Hana barked in response, but didn't move.

Berwald pinched the bridge of his nose, sighing.

Tino was so cute.

But maybe he was spending too much time with Matthias...

*

The kitchen smelled like coffee when they got home after their walk. Matthias was working again, and Lukas was sitting outside, drinking coffee from his red coffee mug. Emil was in his room. No one knew what he was doing, of course.

Hana ran into the house, immediately running to her water bowl and taking a long drink. Tino flopped down in the couch, sighing. "That was fun, Ber, right?"

Berwald shrugged, recalling exactly what had happened. After Tino finished acting like a knight, Hana finally started moving, due to the fact that there was a restaurant down the street. She was running so fast that the leash slipped out of Tino's hands, and he tripped and fell, which resulted in Berwald falling on top of him.

So no, it had not been fun.

"What happened to you two?" Lukas asked as he refilled his coffee mug.

Tino sighed, smiling. "A long story for another time."

Lukas stared at Tino for a moment before nodding knowingly. "You tripped, didn't you."

Tino laughed nervously for a moment, then nodded, frowning.

"Ah...okay." Lukas walked away. "You're free to have some coffee if you would like."

"Thank you!" Tino said, smiling. He stood up, grabbed a mug, then looked over at Berwald, who was cleaning his glasses. "Ber, do you want some?"

"No."

"Okay, then!" Tino said, filling up the mug.

Then Lukas walked past them, knocking on Emil's door. "Emil, I have some licorice for you."

"All right," Emil said, opening the door, taking the licorice out of his brother's hand. "Thank you."

"I'M BACK!"

"Oh, great." Lukas sighed, closed Emil's door again, then dragged himself out of the hall and to the front door, where Matthias was kneeling, taking off his shoes.

"Today was great, bro!" The Dane cried, jumping up after taking off his shoes. "Berwald, I'm so glad you let me fill in for you at your job! There's some funny people with some funny stories there!"

"Oh, you could hear someone over your yelling for once?" Lukas deadpanned.

"Yep!"

Berwald sighed at the mention of his job.

"And don't you dare call me 'bro'. I'm not your 'bro'."

"You call me 'bror' though!"

"That was before I realized we were soulmates."

Matthias raised his eyebrows at him. "What?"

Lukas blinked at him, then facepalmed. "Oh no."

"What? Bro, you're-"

Lukas walked back to Emil's room and slammed the door. Matthias looked genuinely confused. He walked into the living room, where Tino and Berwald were sitting with Hanatamago. "What's wrong with Lukas?"

Berwald shrugged. Tino shook his head. "Sorry, Matthias, I don't know either."

"He just said some really weird things! He said we were soulmates," Matthias continued, rubbing his chin.

Tino looked at Berwald, and Berwald looked at Tino.

"Uh..."

 


	11. Chapter 11

"Emil, do you have an idea of what went wrong?"

Emil was sprawled across his bed, staring up at the ceiling, as Lukas puzzled over the spell book at the desk Berwald had made a couple years back. He groaned. His brother's chatter was keeping him awake, which was rare, due to the fact that Lukas didn't usually talk much. Mr. Puffin was a few inches from his hand, but he was too tired to grab him. He pressed a pillow over his ears and muttered,"Go to sleep."

Lukas turned around and looked over at Emil, whose eyes were half-closed. His own violet eyes wondered over to the clock, which read 10:53 PM. Oh. "Sorry," Lukas said, turning off the lamp on the desk and walking over to Emil's bed, pulling the sheets from under him, tucking his brother in. He made his way over to the door, starting to open it, but then stopped. "Hm..."

"What?"

"Do you mind if I sleep here, once again?"

Emil didn't care at this point, and didn't answer. He scooted over to make room for Lukas, who laid down beside him, taking the cell-phone clip out of his hair and setting it on the nightstand. He closed his eyes, and fell asleep a few minutes later.

Emil looked over at him, suddenly far from tired. There he was, his big brother. He reached over and squeezed his sleeping brother's hand.

A thought surfaced, and it brought with it memories of searching for his family in Iceland for long, lonely years.

For some reason, he thought of Ivan. Sure, he had "friends" and "family", but he had no one that actually cared about him. Only one person had, and he was dead. Matthew Williams.

"You know Ivan?" A quiet voice startled Emil, and he looked up to see something floating around the ceiling fan.

Emil was used to seeing horrifying stuff due to his brother's supposed magic, but he had never seen a ghost. He bit his hand to keep from screaming.

"Do you know Ivan?" The thing asked again.

"Yesh," he said around his hand.

The thing was really just a blob of white with indigo eyes, glasses, and a weird curl atop its head. "Finally," it said, stretching its face into what Emil could only guess was a smile. "I-I thought no one could see me. I spent the last few days being sat on by Ivan, so he definitely couldn't see me."

Emil took his hand away from his mouth before raising his eyebrows at it. "How come I can see you?"

"You must have seen someone die. I-I'm sorry about that."

"You're Matthew?"

"Yes," the ghost replied. "I-I know, that's probably hard to see while I am in this form. Sorry..."

"I'm Emil Steilsson," the silver-haired teenager sighed, sitting cross-legged on the bed. Matthew plopped down beside him. "I have never seen anyone die."

"You might not remember it," Matthew said. "That's a good thing."

Lukas shifted in his sleep and muttered something so quietly that Emil could not hear.

Emil turned back to look at Matthew, and another blob like Matthew joined them. The other ghost's laughter was funny, and he turned to look at Emil with wild reddish-purple eyes. "Hey, Birdie, why didn't you introduce me to the stranger?"

Matthew sighed. "Emil, I'm so sorry about him. This is my friend-"

"THE AWESOME!"

"-Gilbert Beilschmidt."

Suddenly, Lukas' eyes opened, and he stared at the ghosts, who stared back at him. Gilbert's mouth was agape, while Matthew was giving Lukas a nervous once-over. "Oh, hello," Lukas said, after a couple of awkward moments of staring. He looked over at Emil. "You can finally see them, Brother?"

Emil raised his eyebrows at Lukas. "Yes," he said, looking back at Matthew and Gilbert.

"That's good," Lukas sighed, patting Gilbert on the head.

The ghost squeezed his eyes shut and grumbled. "Hey, hey! Don't touch me!"

"Whoops," Lukas said sarcastically, poking him, before sitting up. "Why are you here?"

"Emil was thinking about Ivan, and I wanted to know if he could pass a message along for me," Matthew said, sighing as Gilbert started jumping on his head(?).

"Oh," Lukas said. "Unfortunately, we have cut ties between him and Ivan-"

"What?!" Emil yelled, looking over at his brother.

Lukas shrugged. "You saw what happened the other night."

"Oh...well, i-it's fine...I can see if someone else can pass the message along..." Matthew frowned.

Emil grabbed Gilbert and took him off of the other ghost's head. "Stop jumping on him."

"You can't tell me what to do!" Gilbert said, sticking his tongue out at Emil, but staying on the surface of the mattress.

"Lukas, if Matthew's talking to me, I should probably tell Ivan what he needs me to tell him," Emil said, gesturing to Matthew while he spoke.

Lukas rolled his eyes. "Fine. But no more leaning out the kitchen window, having secret discussions in the middle of the night."

"You're not my dad," Emil joked.

"Of course I'm not your father. Our father is dead, and has been for years. But I am your big brother."

Emil frowned. "Our father is dead?"

"Yes, he killed Mother, and afterwards killed himself. He could have just thrown us out of the house, but he had to blame everything on her."

Matthew coughed. "U-um...as interesting as this conversation is, I have to go soon, so is it a yes or a no?"

"Yes," Emil said.

"Tell Ivan that he needs to move on."

"What?"

"He's going to drink himself to death if he doesn't move on from the days he saw me in the clouds. He needs to understand the face he sees now is his true soulmate, and that fate was wrong from the beginning."

"What face?"

Matthew and Gilbert had both disappeared by then, however. Lukas turned to Emil. "That's the thing about ghosts, Emil, they can't stay forever."

"Why could I see them in the first place?"

Lukas didn't answer. Instead, he just said,"Go to sleep, Icey."

"Lukas, answer me!"

"If you really want to know...then call me 'Big Brother'."

"Why do you want me to call you that so badly?" Emil grumbled, glaring over at him.

"You wouldn't understand." Lukas shifted uncomfortably beside him.

"What wouldn't I understand?"

"We can see the ghosts because we saw our parents die, Ice. Now it's my job to look after you."

Emil noticed Lukas' eyes brimming with tears, and gasped.

"You know why I'm so god damn emotionless?" Lukas said, noticing the tears in his own eyes and furiously wiping them away. "Emotions always get the best of people. Emotions get people hurt. Emotions are a weakness in everyone. You saw what happened to Berwald. I just want to be strong for you, Icey, okay?"

Emil wasn't sure how to answer. He certainly never had seen his brother like this.

"I had to wipe Matthias' memories-twice-to keep you safe. Do you think I like doing that? And now look what I did, I fucked everything up again. Now he doesn't remember anything about us being together." Lukas was sobbing by now, though somehow still keeping his voice the slightest bit controlled. "I don't want to end up like Berwald, unable to talk correctly and unable to remember things, if anything ever happens to you or Matthias or anyone else in this hellhole that I care about. If someone else dies, then I may as well just follow their footsteps, right?"

*

Meanwhile, Matthias, Berwald, and Tino had heard their entire conversation.

Berwald, after hearing what the Norwegian said about him, walked back to his and Tino's room and locked the door behind him.

Matthias stood at the door, however, stars in his eyes. "Wait, he wasn't lying?" He turned to Tino, a goofy grin on his face. "WE'RE-"

Tino shushed him.

"Lukas and I are actually soulmates?" Matthias whisper-yelled, shaking Tino's shoulders roughly. "No kidding?"

Tino nodded, exasperated.

"Whoa! That's amazing!" Matthias cried, skipping back over to his room.

Tino was left alone out in the hall. He slowly walked over to Berwald's door and knocked, only to be met with silence.

He sighed. True, what Lukas had said was mean, but he didn't really mean it, did he? "Ber?"

No one answered once again, but Tino could hear something from inside the room.

"Ber! It's cold out here!"

A few seconds passed, then the doorknob clicked and Berwald opened the door for the Finnish man. "Thank you, Ber!" Berwald grabbed his hand and pulled him over to their bed, laying him down before opening his wardrobe, pulling out some warm blankets. He walked over and started surrounding Tino with them. "Um...thanks!"

"Are you still cold?" Berwald asked after joining Tino under the fluffy blankets.

Tino shook his head.

"Okay."

"Berwald, forget about what Lukas said. I think you're amazing!"

"I'm becoming a burden to you, aren't I?"

"N-no!"

Berwald searched Tino's eyes. "Sure?"

"Yeah, Berwald! I love you!"

Berwald smiled once again at him, then wrapped his arms loosely around him.

Tino fell asleep seconds later, and Berwald followed soon after.

*

"Gilbert, you were wasting too much time! I could've told them more!"

"They were obviously about to start to have a depressing conversation. C'mon, Birdie, I was trying to save us from having to deal with that!"

"Sometimes I want to throttle you bastards, you know that?"

Three ghosts sat on top of the house, looking up at the sky.

One had darker blonde hair, one had brown hair, and one had light blonde hair, almost white.

"Why do those bastards prefer those little beach ball forms, anyway? Transforming hurts!" The brunette grumbled, crossing his arms angrily.

"Because they're cute, I guess," Matthew said, rubbing his arm. "And you can't blame someone for thinking something's cute."

"You know plenty about cute, Lovi, right? After all, you did live with your little brother..." Gilbert snickered, elbowing the Italian sitting beside him.

"Shut up about my little brother!" Lovino whined, covering his face with his hands.

"Eh, Gilbert, why are you talking about Feliciano when you have me?" Matthew said, frowning.

"Well, he is cute!"

Suddenly, they could hear loud crying somehow coming through the roof.

"See, Mattie? Now someone's crying-just minutes after I wasted your time. And-yeesh-that's some loud, disgusting-sounding crying."

"I wish I could help them," Matthew sighed. "There's a lot people won't understand until it's too late."

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The ghosts are just the Mochitalia versions of them when they're with certain people. If the ghosts are trying to say something important, they turn into a more suitable form than a person that is slightly transparent. Some people can't handle that kind of form, so the ghosts change into something that is more suitable and less scary. Some of those forms are cute animals (like Kumajiro and Gilbird), some are magical creatures (like Flying Mint Bunny), and others are the mochi versions of the characters. It depends on who it is.


	12. Chapter 12

_Warm_.

Berwald opened his eyes, blinking a few times before grabbing his glasses and looking at the clock. The clock read 9:00 AM. He looked down at Tino, who was cuddled up close to him. He smiled and laid back down, hugging Tino closer.

Tino opened one eye and looked up at Berwald, grinning. "Good morning," he said.

"Morning."

"Mm...is Matthias making breakfast?"

The Swede shrugged and stood up, opening the bedroom door. "No," he said, frowning. "Door's closed."

"What?" Tino wondered, peeking out the door.

Sure enough, Matthias' door was shut. However, Emil's door was open, and Lukas was laying on the floor in the hall, staring at the ceiling.

"Uh...Lukas?"

Lukas didn't say anything.

Tino lightly kicked Lukas' side. "Lukas, get off the floor," he said, frowning.

"No."

Berwald had never seen Lukas laying like this on the floor and grabbed his arm, trying to pull the Norwegian up. All he accomplished was dragging him to the kitchen. Lukas sighed and slowly stood up. "Emil said I was keeping him up, so he kicked me out."

"Bro, you were crying! You kept all of us up!" Matthias said, quickly running out of his room and towards the front door, his hair somehow messier than usual. "I'm already late to work, so someone else make breakfast, all right? Bye." Then, he slammed the door behind him.

"Did I keep everyone up?" Lukas mumbled, wearily, rubbing his eyes.

"Yes," Tino said, gesturing to Berwald. "I also think an apology is in order."

"Huh?" Lukas asked. "What do you mean?"

"You insulted Ber last night by saying you didn't want to end up like him. If you did end up like him, that would be a blessing. And I know he can get his memories back if he just tries a little harder." Tino crossed his arms and glared at the Norwegian.

Lukas sighed. "He won't get his memories back."

"Why not?" Tino said, his hands on his hips.

"Tino, Berwald won't get his memory back. When you left, it was too much for him. He won't ever remember anything before that period of time. If he did, it would be a miracle." Lukas pushed past Tino, who, until then, had been blocking the rest of the hall.

Tino dropped his arms and sighed, looking up at Berwald with sad, indigo eyes. "I'm sorry about that."

"S'fine," Berwald muttered, walking back to their room and looking around before asking,"Where's the dog?"

"Emil took him for a walk," Lukas offered, from the kitchen. "He will be back soon."

"Hm," Tino wondered. "I always thought Emil didn't really like Hana."

Berwald shrugged.

Lukas was making breakfast when Berwald and Tino walked back out to the kitchen. As soon as they sat down to eat, there was a knock at the door, and Lukas sighed, standing back up and walking over to the door, opening it.

"Hey, Lukas. I was wondering how-"

"Who are you?"

"What? You-you don't know who I am?" A pause. "You are Lukas, right?"

"Yes, I am Lukas Bondevik. Who are you?"

"I'm Eduard von Bock."

"Congratulations. I still don't know who you are."

Before Berwald knew it, Tino had pushed back from the table and sprinted out to the front door. He stood up and walked after him, finally seeing who was at the door.

It was a short man with blonde hair and bangs, glasses, and a green suit. He was currently being hugged by Tino. The Swedish man tensed up, walking over to them. Lukas stood, face blank, holding the door open. He pulled Tino off of the newcomer and frowned at him.

"Come in, Eduard!" Tino said, from next to Berwald. Eduard looked up at Berwald, eyes wide.

"Are you sure it's okay, Tino?" He said, quietly.

"Oh, of course! After all, you were the one to bring me back here!"

Berwald raised his eyebrows. This man was the one who had brought Tino back? He frowned.

Eduard smiled nervously back up at him. "Hehe..." He walked past him, back stick-straight, shoulders tensed. Berwald was used to strangers behaving this way around him, like the mailmen whenever he answered the door, so he didn't think too much of it. "So, has Ivan come looking for me?" He asked, frowning at Tino.

"Yeah, the other night," Tino sighed, glancing at Berwald out of the corner of his eye. He knew how Berwald felt about that night and felt a little guilty talking about it after a wonderful morning.

"Hm, I thought he would have checked the house first," Eduard said, raising his eyebrows.

Berwald noticed he didn't say 'home', which honestly gave him the creeps. However, Tino continued talking to the strange man. The Swede decided to walk away and pretend to watch the television that was barely used. Lukas walked over and sat down on the couch, grabbing the remote and changing the channel to some weird horror movie, and Berwald sighed. Of course he had to change it to something like that.

"Eduard, I'm willing to let you stay here, but-"

The Estonian sighed. "I don't think Feliks would let me, though. Toris, Raivis, and I started living there after I brought you here, and Feliks was pretty hesitant to let me-"

Berwald coughed and stood up. "You may stay here as long as you want, if it keeps my wife happy."

"Sh!" Lukas shushed them, turning the volume of the TV up.

Eduard froze up and stared at Berwald, whose face was stoic. "Uh. Tino?"

"We have a guest room. If Raivis wants to stay here, that's okay, too," Tino said quickly, smiling gratefully at Berwald. "And, Ber, I'm a grown man, not your wife!"

Berwald shrugged.

"We should probably ask Matthias about this," Lukas chimed in, for once.

Everyone turned and stared at him.

"Well, there are already five people living in this house. I definitely cannot deal with any more than that. Plus, Tino just came back, oh, I don't know, a week ago? We don't need any more new faces showing up around here right now. Oh, and by the way, Berwald, Arthur has a kid he doesn't really want, do you want to adopt him?"

"What?!" Tino yelled, eyes wide. "You just say 'no more new faces' and then you ask Berwald if he wants a kid?!"

Lukas shrugged. "I mean, you two have always wanted one, so..."

Eduard looked awkwardly around at all of them, then said,"Now seems like a bad time for me to be here. Do you need me to go grocery shopping, or anything?"

Tino's eye twitched, and he forced a smile. "Don't be silly," he said, through clenched teeth. "Go grab your bags and unpack them in the guest bedroom while I have a little talk with Lukas."

Berwald sat back down. Yes, he had always wanted a child of his own. When he heard Lukas say that he could adopt one, he wanted to, honestly, hug him. But his sane side stopped him from doing so.

Meanwhile, Tino was chewing out Lukas again for the second time that morning. Unfortunately for him, the horror movie had gotten to a gory part, so his rant kept getting interrupted by screaming and demonic noises. Eventually, Tino gave up and watched the movie with Lukas, and Berwald went outside to check on his plants.

The purple flowers he and Tino had bought were in the exact place the old ones used to be. The snow hadn't entirely melted yet, so there were still patches of white on the ground, but not around the flowers, since he had been digging that area out. They swayed slightly in the breeze. He once again had to admire how beautiful they were.

"Hey, Berwald," Emil's voice broke the peace, and Berwald turned around, just as a furry ball of white attacked him and started licking his face. "Whoa, Hanatamago, get off of him."

A sharp tug on the leash pulled Hana off of the Swede, and he sat up, looking up to see Emil standing there, eyes sad.

"Sorry for taking Hanatamago without asking," he said quietly. "I had to get out of the house for a while."

"Understood," Berwald said, taking Hana's leash off and scratching her behind the ears. "S'okay."

"Good. Why are you out here? And who's car is that?"

"They're watching a horror movie, and Tino's friend came over."

"Oh, great. Now there's even more people in that house?" Emil facepalmed. "I was going to be out for longer, anyway. Call me when his friend is gone."

And with that, Emil walked away again, starting to sing something.

Berwald listened to the song he was singing. Emil's voice was beautiful. In fact, it was the most beautiful singing voice he had ever heard.

The clouds shifted in the sky, as if to say, _"You're lying."_

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If you haven't noticed yet, this soulmate AU is more flexible than the others. That's what Matthew was talking about. The first person you see in the clouds might not stay there forever, if you do something abnormal. Like, if you don't normally litter, then you accidently litter, your soulmate might change due to that. Ehehehe I know that's not how these AUs normally work, but this is fanfiction, guys.


	13. Chapter 13

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Finally, they address the problem of everyone slamming doors.

Lukas stood outside Matthias' door and stared at it for what seemed like an eternity.

Emil was still out, though he had just brought Hanatamago back. Berwald was outside, checking on his flowers, as the dog slept on the porch. Tino was still watching that horror movie. Eduard was unpacking in the guest room.

Matthias was in his room, the door locked, and Lukas couldn't hear any sound behind it.

He hesitantly raised his fist and knocked on the door.

"What?" Asked a muffled voice, and a then there was a soft thump against the door, probably a pillow.

"Matthias, you're back early."

"And?"

"I was just wondering if you were all right," Lukas grumbled, rolling his eyes. "Are you going to let me in or not?"

A few loud footsteps were heard, then Matthias opened the door. "I got fired."

Lukas stared at him, then blinked, frowning. "You're going to blame it on me, aren't you."

"Why were you crying?" Matthias said, face softening.

Lukas pursed his lips and looked at his feet. "Do you know what I did to you?"

"No," Matthias shrugged. "Though it seems like I'm missing something. Just a couple of days ago, you were calling me 'bror', and now you're saying we're soulmates..."

"You...do still see me in the sky, right?" Lukas said the words slowly, still looking at the floor.

"Yeah, I always saw ya up there, but-I mean, now you're acting like it's a big deal..." Matthias frowned. "What did you do?"

"Well, I may have...made a mistake..."

"Whoa, you made a mistake?" Matthias started laughing despite the gloomy atmosphere, and Lukas glared at him.

"Stupid Dane," he grumbled, rolling his eyes. "Do you understand how dire the situation is? I tried to take away your memories just enough so that my two favorite people would stop fighting so much, and I ended up taking away a year's worth of memories instead."

The Dane's face fell. "What?"

Lukas swallowed hard and focused his gaze on Matthias. "You don't remember anything because of me. Is that easy enough for you to understand?"

Matthias sighed. "Great, more memory stuff." He sat down on the edge of his bed, then patted the place next to him. Lukas sat down beside him. "So, it's just the Berwald incident again, except you were taking my memories away on purpose?"

"I did that whenever you and Emil got into a fight, actually. I borrowed a book from my friend, Arthur Kirkland, who is visiting from England. It has a memory spell in there. I used it too much."

"Oh." Lukas looked over at his soulmate once again. Matthias smiled. "Huh. I can't imagine getting in a fight with Emil, but...I guess that's all right. If Tino can help Berwald, than you can help me, right?"

"Your constant optimism never fails to surprise me," Lukas said, biting back a very rare smile.

Matthias shrugged. "Your...uh...constant stoic...ness...never fails to surprise me."

"I don't think stoic-ness is a word."

"Are you going to help me look for a new job tomorrow?" Matthias asked.

"You seriously don't mind me stealing your memories?"

"Oh, well...I get it. If I had a little brother, I'd go out of my way to protect him, too."

"Matthias, it wasn't just him I was trying to protect."

"OH! That's sweet and all, but I think I can protect myself from a seventeen year old," Matthias laughed.

"You're hopeless," Lukas growled, standing up. "I thought we could, for once, focus on the important parts of a conversation, Narcissus."

"But I c-"

Matthias was cut off by Lukas grabbing his tie and pulling it back, hard, choking him until his face turned blue. Then he let go of the tie, grabbed Matthias' head, and kissed him.

The Dane was astonished, and when Lukas walked away, slamming the door behind him, his face turned bright red, and he buried it in a pillow.

*

Berwald came inside a few minutes later, finding Tino browsing through the channels to find something else to watch. He sat down beside him, and Tino smiled at him, before turning his attention to the television once again.

"Tino," he said, still looking over at him.

"Yes?"

"You thought anymore about the child?"

Tino dropped the remote and stared at Berwald, shocked. "I thought you didn't want one!"

Berwald shrugged.

"Ah! Thank you thank you thank you! You have no idea how much I've wanted a child!" Tino cried, throwing his arms around Berwald, pulling himself into his lap. The Swede blushed and hugged him back, closing his eyes, sighing.

Tino smelled like grass, wine, and peppermint.

"You smell good," he said quietly in Tino's ear.

"U-um...thanks?" Tino stuttered, raising his eyebrows.

Lukas walked into the room, and Tino stood up. "What happened to Matthias?"

"He was fired," Lukas said, walking out the door, face red.

Matthias ran past them a few minutes later, yelling for him to come back, and followed him out the door, once again slamming the door.

"Why do they all have to slam the doors?" Tino asked, frowning at Berwald.

"Don't know," he said. Tino sat back down next to him.

"Hey, Ber?" He asked suddenly, looking up at him.

"Hm?"

"Do you think things will ever be the way they were before I left?" Tino seemed very uncomfortable saying it, but Berwald could understand why he asked.

"Don't know that, either. But I think not." Berwald looked over at Tino.

His soulmate sighed, leaning back in the sofa. "Well, I heard somewhere that if it doesn't all work out in the end, that means it's not the end yet, so we'll be okay, don't worry!"

Berwald nodded.

"So," Tino said, looking up at him, face hopeful. "Are we going to go see Lukas' friend?"

"Yes."

Tino smiled. "I love you, Ber."

"I love you too." Berwald smiled.

"Wait," Tino said, smile fading. "Did Lukas say Matthias was fired?"

Berwald's smile turned into a frown as well, and he chewed on his lip.

"And where's Emil?"

*

Emil was staring up at the clouds a few miles away, watching as they shifted from Lukas to nothing to the mystery person, then back again.

"Decide already," he said, glaring at them.

He abruptly sat up, feeling someone's eyes on him, and turned to see someone lying in the grass a short run away. He raised his eyebrows and started walking towards the person, who was sitting up slowly, propping themselves up with their elbows. "Who are you?"

The person looked very familiar, but their facial expression certainly didn't."You." They said, standing up, staring at him. "What are you doing here?"

Now that he was closer, Emil knew who it was.

"We meet again," he grumbled, crossing his arms.

"Will you just decide who you want already?" The other person said, rolling their eyes. "Seeing the clouds switch like that and knowing that there is a possibility that no one will ever love you is awful."

"It's not my fault I'm cursed to love my brother, Leon," Emil said, taking a few steps closer.

"Don't you realize that can get you killed?" Leon said, sounding concerned.

"Aren't you going to ask how I know your name?"

"Your brother's magic, I know, I know. My brothers have friends that know Lukas."

Emil sighed, pinching the bridge of his nose. "Leon, go home. Why are you even in Denmark?"

"Why are _you_ in Denmark?" Leon asked, shrugging.

Emil hesitated, honestly not knowing the answer to that question.

"If you don't know why _you're_ here, does it really make sense to ask why _someone else_ is here?"

"You have a point," Emil said, sighing. "I should probably head back home."

"Do you want me to go with you?" Leon asked, the corners of his mouth lifting slightly.

Emil stared at him, raising his eyebrows. "Why?"

"I don't know, that's just...something soulmates usually do."

Emil looked back up at the sky, and the fluffy white clouds took the shape of Leon. "Why do the clouds change?" He asked, looking back at Leon.

Leon shrugged.

"I thought that soulmates were supposed to be meant for each other, but if they keep changing, that has to be a lie."

"Well..." Leon frowned at the sky. "I heard once from somewhere the phrase, 'fate may be thwarted'."

"Maybe that has something to do with it?"

"It does," a quiet voice said, and Emil froze, then turned around to see one of the ghosts from the other night, smiling at him.


	14. Chapter 14

When Emil got home, Lukas was sitting out on the porch, seeming to be talking to himself.

"What's your brother doing?" Leon asked, raising his eyebrows at him.

Emil shrugged. "Probably talking to the trolls."

"Trolls?"

Emil shrugged again and waved at Lukas, who didn't acknowledge him or Leon. "Okay, then." They walked past him and up to the door, when suddenly, Lukas stood up and grabbed Leon's arm.

"Who are you?" He asked, face completely straight.

"Li Xiao Chun. But Leon is easier to say."

Lukas stared at him for one full minute, then shook his head, sighing. "Well, your future is bleak. Good luck trying to get Emil to like you."

Emil snorted. However, the Norwegian was completely serious, and neither of them got that message. Leon's eyes were shocked, but his facial expression stayed the same. "Thank you," he said, his mouth twitching.

The silver-haired teenager saw the tension between them and sighed, walking inside the house, where he was greeted by a smiling Matthias, who immediately gave him a hug.

"Why are you so happy?" Emil asked, frowning.

"Why are you so _un_ happy?"

Emil shoved Matthias off of him and continued walking into the living room, where he saw a new face sitting next to Tino on the couch. Berwald was sitting on the other side of Tino, holding his hand. "Hey, who's that?" He asked, gesturing to the man sitting next to Tino.

"It's my friend, Eduard! He's staying with us for a bit!" Tino said, smiling. "Isn't that nice?"

"I guess," Emil said, frowning. "But why-?"

"He brought me back after taking his friends to Feliks' house, then went back there, but then got scared that Mr. Braginsky would try and find him," said Tino, as Eduard kept unsuccessfully trying to interrupt him.

"Are you Emil?" Eduard asked, smiling at him.

"Yes," Emil said, pursing his lips. He walked out of the living room and went to his room, closing the door and grabbing Lukas' friend's book. The book was black, hard-covered, and had a purple pentagram on it, with the name "Arthur Kirkland" written neatly underneath. He flipped through the pages, seeing hundreds of sketches of weird creatures, summoning circles, and notes in black ink. He had flipped to a page with something called a "Fauchereve" on it when Lukas walked in, jaw set, eyes narrowed slightly.

"Is this Leon character your soulmate?" He asked, snatching the book from Emil, slamming it shut.

"Uh..."

"He is, and I have to say this truthfully, a selfish asshole. Even more annoying than Matthias," Lukas said, crossing his arms. "And he brings with him the end of all things for this particular household."

Emil stared up at Lukas, eyes wide. "What? You seriously lost me, Lukas."

Lukas blinked, looking back down at his brother. "Did you find anything interesting in Arthur's book?"

"No," Emil said, "I didn't understand half of what it was saying."

"Ah, good."

"So you wiped Matthias' memory with one of the spells in that book?"

Lukas nodded, opening the book again and turning to a page covered in Latin. "It's addicting to turn back the clock on someone's mind and make them forget, which is why this spell is so dangerous. It's also why you. Need. To. Leave. It. Alone." He closed the book and hit Emil over the head with it gently, eyes narrowed. "I'm taking it back to Arthur for this reason. I'll be gone for a few days to discuss a reversal spell with him and Vladimir." He sighed, rubbing the back of his neck. "I hope Matthias won't hate me if-when he gets his memories back."

Emil sighed. "I'm sure he won't."

"You know why our parents are dead, right?" Lukas asked, frowning down at him.

"No, why?" Emil asked, confused at why Lukas had suddenly brought that up.

"Well, our mother had magical abilities. She was the most powerful of her kind. But she married our father, who really only wanted her money," he said, rolling his eyes. "She didn't realize that, though. And one night, she ignited the logs in the fireplace with just a flick of her hand, and Father, being the fully devoted Christian he was, deemed her magic a work of the Devil and shot her, then shot himself for having married her."

Emil raised his eyebrows. "What about the soulmate thing?"

"Oh, Emil," Lukas laughed, a bittersweet smile on his face. "I started that."

"What?!" Matthias cried from the doorway.

Lukas and Emil jumped, alarmed, and whipped around, glaring at him.

"S-sorry! I just heard some interesting stuff so I thought I could-" Matthias was cut off by Berwald, who tugged him forcefully away from the door.

"You're the one that started the soulmate thing?!" Emil cried, staring at him.

"Yes, it was because I didn't want what happened to our parents to happen to any other couples. It was a stupid decision, I know," Lukas sighed. "But I was only six."

"Then...can't you undo it?" Emil asked.

"I suppose I could, but it's funny to see people running around, thinking that there's only truly one person out there for them," Lukas said. "I mean, look at Ivan: it's been years since his soulmate died, and here he is thinking that Matthew was the only person for him. Well, it turns out that Matthew's moved on, and so has everyone else."

"That's kind of mean, don't you think?" Emil asked, frowning.

"It's not mean at all. He needs to figure it out himself-he has to make the choice to move on," Lukas said, smiling slightly. "That's what's beautiful about it."

"So...you meant it when you said that who you saw in your clouds was just the person that would always care about you more than anybody else?" The teenager's frown slowly started to fade into a smile, and Lukas nodded. "So no one's going to die?"

Lukas stopped smiling. "Uh..."

"Lukas?"

"I...might," he said, quietly, sighing.

"What?!"

"We should talk about this later. It will only depress you if I tell you now, Emil."

Emil shrugged. "Fine, we can talk about it later," he sighed. "But...are you sure that that's all the 'soulmate' thing was?"

"The first people that realized that the person they saw in the clouds was the person they ended up probably marrying-they're the ones that came up with that description." Lukas sounded exasperated at this point, and Emil decided that this would be a good time to stop asking questions.

"I'm going to see Ivan," he said, jumping up from the bed and walking out the door.

*

Berwald heard everything that Lukas had said.

So did Eduard.

Tino and Matthias had only heard bits and pieces of it, and only stayed by the door long enough to hear about how Lukas and Emil's parents had died.

Matthias was the first one to speak. "So, we just ran around for years and years, trying to find each other, for nothing?" Seconds later, Emil bolted out of his room and ran outside, stealing Matthias' car and driving away. "Hey!" The Dane cried, before stopping himself. "Well, as long as he drives responsibly..."

"It's not like you drive responsibly, Dane," Lukas spat as he walked past him, arms crossed, about to walk out the door.

"Hey, Lukas, where's my kiss?" Matthias joked, smiling at the Norwegian, who froze.

Lukas turned slowly, breathing heavily out of his nose, then walked over to Matthias, grabbing his tie.

"Lukas, don't strangle him again," Tino chided, frowning.

Matthias stared down at Lukas as he continued pulling on his tie until they were face-to-face. "Uh, hey," he said, a nervous smile on his face.

"You want a kiss, Matthias?" Lukas asked slowly, wrapping the tie around his fingers. "Then you can kiss my ass."

"I'll take you up on that offer, too--HEY!" Matthias yelped as Lukas slapped him.

Lukas let go of his tie, then continued walking towards the door.

"Wait, where are you going?" Asked Matthias, frowning. "You're not leaving without me, are you?"

Lukas paused, before turning around again. "Ah...I suppose it would be useful to bring you with me, since your memory is the memory we're trying to fix."

"Wait, who's we?"

"Arthur, Vladimir, and I," Lukas said.

"Oh! Yeah, okay, but seriously, you don't have to help me this much, Lukas," Matthias beamed.

Lukas blushed, then sighed. "Let's go."

As they left, Tino turned to Berwald, smiling.

"They're such a cute couple."

Eduard nodded in agreement. "They do. Raivis would have so much fun here, with all of the...romantic tension...?"

Tino chuckled. "He would, honestly."

Berwald continued thinking about what Lukas said, staring at the wall in front of them. It was covered in pictures; there had always been pictures up there, he knew, but none of them had brought back memories like this before.

He saw the star sapphire rings; one on his own finger, one inside a case. He saw Tino next to him, in a sauna, wearing nothing but a towel.

And then he saw Ivan, and Tino being taken from him. 

He blinked.

"Ber? Berwald Oxenstierna? Are you all right?" Tino's voice asked, sounding concerned.

Berwald's face grew hot, and he twisted the ring around his finger. "Are...we..."

Tino's indigo eyes widened. "What?"

"Are we...married?"

Tino looked alarmed. "What? Berwald, were you getting your memories back?"

Berwald gestured to the wall of pictures, and Tino looked back at him, confused.

"Looking at the pictures...helped you remember?"

"A little."

Tino's face lit up. "I knew it, Ber!" He looked up at him, indigo eyes sparkling. "I love you!"

Eduard still sat awkwardly beside them, tapping the keys of his laptop. His face had turned pink, and he was clearly watching them interact, smiling a little.

"Love you too, Tino," Berwald said. "But...I saw something."

"Did you see Mr. Braginsky taking me?" Tino asked, sighing.

"Yes," Berwald said, once again.

"I'm sorry. I wish I could forget that too, Berwald."

"Don't. S'horrible not remembering anything," Berwald mumbled.

*

"Emil left, and Lukas and Matthias went to Arthur's," Tino sighed, looking over the couch and out the window.

Berwald, Tino, and Eduard had just finished eating supper, and Eduard was trying to locate a virus on his laptop. Every time he thought he had found it and didn't, he would mumble,"Dammit," and Berwald would sigh, and Tino would look out the window, watching for both of the cars to come back. Eduard's car was still parked in the driveway, but going out and looking for the others was useless at that point, since none of them knew where Arthur's house was or where Emil went. Tino had a sneaking suspicion that Emil had gone to see Ivan.

His mind staying on the topic of Ivan, he asked,"Eduard, what do you think Mr. Braginsky is going to do, now that he knows that Matthew is dead?"

Eduard froze, and turned slowly to look at him. "What?"

"Mr. Braginsky found out that Matthew died."

The Estonian man slammed his head on the keyboard. "Oh no," he said, lifting his head a few seconds later. "Does he know that it was him that killed Matthew?"

Tino shook his head. "No, and I didn't either."

"Now he's going to kill me for lying to him," Eduard sighed. "What if he tries to hurt Raivis? Or Toris? Well, Toris would be okay, Feliks is pretty protective of him..."

Tino gingerly touched Eduard's arm. "Eduard, calm down."

"Sorry, Tino," Eduard said quietly, turning back to his computer. "I'm just really stressed because I can't find this virus, and because Mr. Braginsky hacked my blog-again."

"Hey, what's that?" Tino suddenly asked, pointing to something on Eduard's screen.

Eduard quickly exited out of what Tino had pointed to and shook his head, blushing. "N-nothing!"

"It was a picture of someone's back."

"No it wasn't."

"There were scars on that person's back."

"No there weren't."

"That was Toris, wasn't it?" Tino asked, frowning. "Did Mr. Braginsky do that?" Berwald sighed, now annoyed by everyone being so formal when it came to the Russian man.

Eduard sucked in a breath.

"Is your back like that, too?" Tino looked worried. "Why would he do something like that?"

"He's very dangerous when he doesn't take his pills, Tino," Eduard said, pulling the picture back up. "I took this picture when I was asking my friend how to treat wounds like this. Toris was losing so much blood, it would have been useless calling a hospital. Mr. Braginsky ended up helping me clean them, but he had no idea that he was the one who gave him those wounds."

Berwald stared at the picture of Toris' bloody back and looked at Tino's horrified face, wanting to cover his eyes, even though he knew that Tino would definitely say he was okay. _That could have happened to him_ , Berwald thought grimly, looking away from the computer.


	15. Chapter 15

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Berwald thought Tino was just kidnapped.  
> Hahaha.  
> Nope.  
> Lukas reminisces about their first fight.

"And, Lukas."

"Yes?"

"Do spend some time with him before you leave. It would be a shame if you left and he had no idea how much you loved him."

*

Matthias was sound asleep in the back of Lukas' car.

His memory had been returned to him, all except for memories of his and Emil's arguments, per Lukas' request. Arthur had advised the Norwegian to let Matthias sleep for a few hours afterwards, or else his memory might have messed up again.

Lukas' eyelids were growing heavy and his wrists were starting to hurt from driving so long. The road was beginning to grow blurry. He pulled over and parked the car in a convenience store parking lot, afterwards looking back at Matthias, who was still asleep. He was smiling, curled up like a puppy in the backseat.

Lukas got out of the car and opened the back door slowly, so as not to wake Matthias, then wedged himself in the seat next to him, closing his eyes.

A few hours later, Matthias woke up to see Lukas next to him, asleep, breathing softly. He was gripping the Dane's hand loosely, using his back as a pillow, which Matthias found adorable. "Sleep well, elsker," he whispered, smiling. He unclipped the Nordic Cross clip from his hair and set it aside, before closing his eyes again.

*

That night was the first night in a while that the current residents of the Køhler house slept peacefully.

Berwald woke up with Hanatamago pouncing on him again, licking his face, and Tino laughing.

He opened his eyes, vision blurred, and reached over for his glasses on the nightstand.

But they weren't there.

"Tino, where's m-"

Before he could finish the sentence, Tino had grabbed his face and kissed him, before putting the glasses on Berwald's face. "Good morning, Ber!" He said, smiling.

Berwald stared at Tino, eyes wide.

"W-what?" Tino stuttered, his face falling.

"You kissed me," the Swede mumbled.

"O-oh! Sorry! I thought you would like that!"

Berwald's face softened and he leaned forward, kissing Tino again.

Tino's eyes were wide, and he was nervously twisting the ring around his finger, but he kissed him back.

"Cute," Berwald said, after pulling away, ruffling the Finnish man's hair.

"Thanks," Tino said, his smile returning.

A knock sounded at their bedroom door, and Berwald stood up, opening it. Eduard stood there, chewing on his lip. "Emil came back," he said, frowning.

Berwald nodded.

"I don't think he's okay," The Estonian stated, a worried look on his face.

"What?!" Tino cried, jumping up from the bed, startling Hana, who hid behind Eduard's legs. "Where is he?!"

"In his room."

Berwald pushed past Eduard and looked in Emil's room, where Emil was laying on his bed, staring up at the ceiling, tears slowly dripping from the corners of his eyes down his face.

Tino ran over to him, face pale. "Emil? What happened?"

Emil didn't say anything, just continued staring at the ceiling, breathing slowly.

"Emil?!"

"Hm?" Emil looked over at Tino, but seemed to be looking right through him. "What?"

"What happened?!"

"Shut up!" Emil snapped, glaring at them.

"Can you move? Why are you crying?" Tino said, trying to calm down.

Emil sat up. "How could you possibly love someone like that?!"

Tino stared at the teenager, eyes wide. "What?" He looked around, but there was nobody else in the room that was talking. Berwald and Eduard were staring at Emil, eyes wide.

"Shut up, Matthew. You're the one that told me to go to Ivan's house, told me to tell him to move on, told me to tell him it was you that said it! But guess what? He didn't want to hear it, and threw a fucking chair at me! So stop saying that it was a good thing to go there!" Emil pushed past Tino, Berwald, and Eduard, muttering curses under his breath, and Eduard turned to Tino and shrugged.

"He's been talking to himself all morning," he said quietly, sighing. "He doesn't seem to be seeing anything real right now."

Tears were running down Tino's face by this point. "What should we do?"

"See if he has any wounds." Eduard bit his lip. "I can call his brother to see if he can help."

"Lukas is probably still with his friends," Tino said, pacing. "What should we do while we're waiting?"

Berwald watched Tino pace and walked over to him, wiping his tears away with his sleeve. "Calm down," he said, giving him a hug. "Don't worry about him right now."

"But he's part of our family, Berwald! How am I supposed to not care about him?" Tino said, pushing away from the Swede, who stepped back, hurt clear in his eyes. "W-Wait, Ber, I'm sorry-"

Berwald stared at him for a few more moments before walking away.

Eduard sighed. "I'm sorry for ruining your morning," he mumbled.

"No, no! It's okay, Eduard! It would have been even worse if you hadn't told us something was wrong!" Tino said, reassuringly, trying to collect himself.

"I guess you're right..."

"Eduard, if you don't want to be here, you can go back home," Tino stated, lowering his voice. "I can tell you're not very happy here. You haven't been yourself lately."

"I'm not," Eduard said, tapping his chin. "And I don't think any of us can ever be happy again, having lived with a man that overworks us and abuses us for absolutely no reason, then denies the whole thing."

Tino frowned at him. "I'm sure it's not that bad."

"Raivis is constantly paranoid. Why do you think he shakes so much? Toris doesn't like anybody touching him, or touching anybody else, and it's so bad that sometimes he even refuses to let Feliks hug him and kiss him. And me? Well, it's not as bad as the others, but I still have a hard time trusting people sometimes. Ivan has done things to all of us, even the only person he's ever truly loved." Eduard took a deep breath before saying,"Tino, you're lucky you're still yourself."

"Why didn't he do that stuff to me?"

"He thought you were Matthew for the first few days he saw you, don't you remember him calling you 'Matthew' for a while?"

"Oh, yeah! I remember that now!" Tino bit his lip. "I thought he was just being funny."

"He didn't want Matthew to 'run off' again, so even after he realized you weren't Matthew, he kept you. And you didn't even seem to notice the pills, or Ivan's odd behavior, or how one of us would randomly go missing for a few days. And you remember Gilbert? That guy that was there for a few months before he randomly disappeared? Ivan killed him." Eduard closed his eyes and massaged his temples. "I need to take a nap to clear my head."

"But it's 9 in the-"

"I woke up at one o'clock, when Emil got home. I didn't get anymore sleep after that, because he was yelling at himself." Eduard breathed out heavily through his nose before muttering,"Good night," to Tino and walking away.

Emil was in the living room, squeezing a pillow around his ears.

"Emil!" Tino cried, running over to the Icelandic teenager, grabbing his shoulders.

Emil opened his eyes, the tears still running down his face, though they started to slow when his eyes finally focused on Tino. "H-huh?"

"Emil, calm down, you're scaring everyone."

"The ghosts..." He said, covering his ears more tightly. "I need Lukas here. Right now."

"Okay, well, he-he can't be here right now, he's with-"

"CALL HIM! NOW!"

"Emil, please-"

"NO! LET ME TALK TO MY BROTHER!" He yelled, punching Tino in the nose, before covering his mouth in shock. "Oh my-I-I'm sorry..."

Tino sighed. "It doesn't matter. Where's Mr. Puffin?"

Emil started crying harder, and Tino looked back down the hall, where there was a trail of black and white fabric and stuffed animal stuffing, and Tino gasped. "What happened?"

"Ivan! It's all IVAN'S-no, it's all MATTHEW'S FAULT! YEAH, YOU, MATTHEW!" Emil yelled, taking large gulps of air, though it didn't seem to be helping him at all.

Blood had started to drip from Tino's nose as he watched Emil cry, staring up at the ceiling, yelling at something no one else could see. He ran over to the phone and dialed Lukas' number, holding it up to his ear.

Emil's brother picked up on the fifth ring. "Lukas Bondevik," he answered, sounding like he had just woken up.

"Hi, Lukas," Tino said, as Emil started coughing loudly from on the couch.

"Is that Emil?" Lukas asked, suddenly sounding alert. "What's going on?"

"He's having a...well, I would say panic attack, but I-I don't really know..." Tino held a tissue to his nose so the blood didn't fall on the floor.

"What have you done so far, and what happened?"

"Ivan threw a chair at him and destroyed Mr. Puffin when he passed along Matthew's message, whatever that means," Tino said,"and he also is being scolded by some ghosts."

"You said Ivan destroyed Mr. Puffin?" Lukas said, sounding angry.

"Yeah, but-"

"Well, maybe I should destroy something he loves." The Norwegian's voice still had absolutely no emotion, but the manner in which he was saying everything made him sound angry. "I'm the one that gave Emil Mr. Puffin when he was very young. Maybe I should take away Ivan's scarf-after all, his older sister gave it to him, and he treasures it more than any other material possession he has."

"You're not helping!" Tino said, exasperated. "Just talk to Emil, okay? I have a nosebleed." He handed the phone to Emil, whose crying almost immediately slowed.

"H-hello?" Emil said uncertainly.

Tino let out a long sigh of relief before walking over to the bathroom to find some gauze.

Berwald was leaning against the wall, curled up in a ball.

"Hey, Ber?" He asked, quietly.

"Tino?" Berwald asked, sitting up and looking up at him.

"I'm sorry I yelled at you. I didn't-"

"You're mad," The Swede said, shaking his head.

"I'm not mad at you, Ber! You were just trying to calm me down and I was so stressed I didn't realize you were trying to help me. I should be apologizing." Tino smiled at him, and Berwald lifted his face from his chest.

"...M'sorry..."

Tino stood up, grabbing Berwald's hand with the hand that wasn't covered in blood, and tried pulling him up. He sighed, and Berwald stood up, still holding on to his hand. "Do you want to go back to sleep?" Tino asked, looking over at him.

"Sure," Berwald said, looking down at a piece of cloth on the floor. "What's that from?"

"Apparently, Ivan destroyed Emil's puffin," Tino answered, sighing. "It's horrible."

Berwald frowned and picked up the cloth, looking at it. "Might be able to fix it."

"You'd do that?!" Tino cried, staring at him. "Really?!"

The Swede nodded, and Tino hugged him. "I have the best soulmate ever!"

"Thank you," he said, smiling slightly.

"Don't thank me, Berwald! Thank the fates that brought us together!" Tino laughed.

 _Thank Lukas,_ Berwald thought, remembering that it was actually Lukas that had started the entire thing. But looking down at Tino's smiling face, he didn't want to say that out loud.

*

Lukas was driving when he got the phone call. Matthias was awake in the back, sitting quietly. 

After Lukas hung up, all he could do was think. 

The last time Berwald and Tino had gotten into a fight, it was years and years ago. Nobody in the Køhler household had been able to sleep.

Lukas had heard everything from his room. He heard Tino's yelling, and he heard Berwald trying to stay collected, his replies quiet and calm. The only thing he didn't hear was why Tino was so upset.

But eventually, something Berwald had said had REALLY pissed him off, because a few seconds later, Tino screamed, and Lukas heard someone walking quickly past his room, and out of the house.

Lukas cringed. Knowing Tino, he was probably going to go to someone else's house and hide out there. He sometimes did that back in high school, when he was angry with his parents.

A few days later, Tino still hadn't come back. However, Lukas had heard from his friend, Natalya, that the Finn was with her brother, Ivan.

Everyone was begging Ivan to let Tino come back home. But Ivan kept saying no.

The worst part was, though, out of all of it, was that Berwald didn't remember anything about his soulmate. It was a good thing, too, though. He didn't want whatever argument they had had to carry on. It seemed like Tino didn't want that, either. He was always careful about what he said around Berwald now.

Lukas sighed. Fighting was a normal thing for him, Emil, and Matthias. But whenever Emil left the house, he had never stayed at someone's house for more than a day. Lukas sighed, remembering that it hadn't been Tino's choice to stay there for more than a day, and that Ivan had pretty much forced him to stay there. 

He hoped that wouldn't happen, because he knew Emil's first choice would be Ivan's place. Well, he did know. He wasn't sure, after he heard what had happened just a few hours ago when his brother had gone there. 

Perhaps now, Emil would hide out at Leon's place?

Lukas shook his head. He didn't want that, either.

*

"So, we're on a date," Lukas said, frowning at Matthias, who had grabbed his hand seconds before and was currently swinging it back and forth. "Would you stop that?"

"Yeah, we're on a date! With a random kid that apparently belongs to Berwald and Tino now!"

Sure enough, on Matthias' other side was a child with blonde hair, thick eyebrows, and a big smile. "I can't wait 'til I meet my new parents! They ought to be better than that jerk Arthur, if they're willing to have me!"

"Arthur is not a jerk, Peter, he's just very busy and can't have a child right now," Lukas chided the child, Peter Kirkland. "Anyway, Matthias. This is a date?"

"I mean, we're out of the house, together, going to go eat delicious food, so...!" Matthias smiled down at his soulmate, who rolled his eyes. "How does it feel to be dating the happiest Dane in the entire world?"

Peter laughed. However, Lukas didn't answer, and instead just stared at the ground.

"Hey, what's wrong? You've been acting weird," the Dane said, frowning at Lukas.

Lukas looked up at him, purple eyes wide. "What?"

"Is something on your mind?"

"No," Lukas answered, nearly too quickly. Matthias narrowed his eyes skeptically at him.

"Are you sure?"

"Yes, Matthias, I'm sure!" The Norwegian snapped, glaring up at him.

Matthias sighed. "Okay, sorry. But if there's something wrong, you can tell me, okay?"

"Fine," Lukas said, exasperated. "I just wanted to know what you would do if I just died out of the blue."

"W-why?" Matthias laughed, blue eyes sparkling, as though Lukas was just telling a funny joke.

"Matthias, stop laughing and listen to me."

"Wait, you're...you're serious?"

"Yes, now shut up and answer my question." Lukas crossed his arms and his face grew blank again, showing absolutely no sign of the emotion that had been there moments before.

"U-uh...well, if you were killed by an animal or a person, I'd hunt them down and kill them," Matthias said, looking down at the ground, pursing his lips. "If it was because of some natural disaster, I'd be cautious around nature from then on." Then his eyes widened and his face grew pale. "Lukas, you-you're not thinking of...suicide, are you?" Once again, Lukas didn't answer. Matthias sighed and shook his head. "Well, if you did kill yourself, I'd go to your grave every day and bring you licorice and coffee, a-and I...wouldn't be the happiest Dane in the world anymore."

"Idiot. I'm not going to commit suicide, you know that."

Matthias didn't reply, but instead turned around and hugged Lukas. "Good."

After a few seconds of hugging in the middle of the street, a few cars beeped at them, and after flipping them off, Lukas and Matthias continued walking, and the spiky, blonde-haired Dane insisted they hold hands, to which Lukas didn't object this time.

Peter continued walking beside them like he hadn't seen or heard anything that had just happened, while continuing to say hi to nearly everyone, though almost none of them acknowledged his existence. He complimented a random Italian man and countless others, smiling, though none of them seemed to notice him. And the ones that did only gave him a curt nod in response.

One of these was a short, black-haired man who was carrying a few books, dressed in very formal clothing, and when he saw Lukas and Matthias, frowned at them. "Excuse me," he said, quietly,"do you know an Emil Steilsson?"

"That's my brother," Lukas answered. "Why?"

"Oh, then you must be Mr. Bondevik. I knew I recognized you. I am related to Leon, as you might know him," the man stated. "He's sorry about how he acted around you the other day."

"Ah, well let him know that I appreciate the apology," Lukas said, his mouth twitching. "And who might you be?"

"I am Honda Kiku."

"And I'm Matthias Køhler!" Matthias piped, holding out his hand for Kiku to shake.

Kiku stared at it for a moment, before awkwardly shaking Matthias' hand.

"And I'm Peter!" Peter said from beside Matthias, smiling at Kiku.

The Japanese man, once again, nodded at him, then looked back up at the others.

"What is with everyone?" Peter sighed, pinching the bridge of his nose.

"Why are you here in Denmark?" Matthias asked Kiku, who hesitated before answering.

"My family and I are here with Mr. Ivan Braginsky," he said. "He asked us to help him find one of his...friends."

"What?" Matthias wondered, raising his eyebrows at Kiku. "You mean that guy that-"

Before he could finish the sentence, Lukas had slapped a hand over Matthias' mouth. Kiku looked at them, confused. "Excuse me?"

"Nothing, sir," Lukas said, still holding his hand over Matthias' mouth. "Matthias is a little cracked in the head."

Matthias made a muffled noise of contempt underneath Lukas' hand. "Sffsphoo," he said, rolling his eyes.

"See?" Lukas said, gesturing to Matthias. "What is he saying?"

"I believe his words are messed up due to you covering his mouth," Kiku declared.

Lukas shrugged. "It was worth a shot," he grumbled, before taking his hand off Matthias' mouth.

"Have you seen Mr. Braginsky's friend?" The Japanese man asked.

"He's at my house right now," Matthias said. "Why?"

"Well, he really seems to want his friend back at his home. I don't understand why he chose us, of all people, to help, and why he needs his friend back. However, if you are not willing to give him up, that is all right."

Peter was looking around at everything, still trying to communicate with the pedestrians around the group of four, but none of them acknowledged him. He sighed.

"My older brother is supposed to be Mr. Braginsky's soulmate," Kiku started explaining.

"Oh, I thought good ol' Ivan would've hated that!" Matthias chuckled. "His last soulmate's gone forever, and he's totally beating himself up about it."

"Well, it may be that he just wanted to meet him," Kiku offered.

Lukas nodded. "Ivan is reasonable, despite his problems." Then he grabbed Peter by the shoulder, who had been trying to walk away, over to a brown-haired girl with an odd hairstyle who was looking at a small bunny in a pet store window.

"But I want to see the-"

"No," Lukas snapped.

"Don't yell at a child like that."

"THANK you!" Peter said, sighing,"FINALLY, someone acknowledges me!"

"Seriously, Matthias, are you going to back me up-" Lukas started.

"Aw! That bunny is adorable!"

Matthias was not next to Lukas. Instead, he was next to the brunette girl, his face pressed up against the glass, and the bunny was looking at him curiously.

"Matthias, really," Lukas sighed.

"But it is! Lukas, come here and pet the cute bunny!"

"I should be going." Kiku nodded at Lukas and Matthias and walked away, but not at all disappearing in the crowd.

 


	16. Chapter 16

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> YEY, more about Peter, more about Emil, and more about Leon!  
> Haha
> 
>  
> 
> Also, don't judge me, I absolutely LOVE the ship Aussieland (which is Australia x Sealand) . As long as Aussie, like, isn't canonly 25. In this fic, he's not -_-  
> I read ONE fanfic for it, now I'm hooked.

Even when Lukas and Matthias returned to the house, Emil still wasn't acting like himself.

"Emil," Lukas said, standing at his brother's door,"Leon's here to see you."

"I don't want to see him," Emil grumbled, laying face-down on his bed. "Tell him he can go back to Hong Kong or whatever."

"Okay," Lukas replied, shrugging. That was what he was going to tell Leon anyway, because honestly, he didn't really like the kid that much.

"Hey, Lukas?" Emil asked, before Lukas walked away.

"Yes?"

"How is Berwald doing with Mr. Puffin?"

"He's almost done. I expect you'll have him back tomorrow, good as new."

"Thanks."

Leon had been coming over to see Emil often, which he found annoyingly cute. However, it was starting to be less cute and more annoying to all of the inhabitants of the house (besides Peter and Matthias, who teased Emil about it).

Lukas walked away to tell Leon 'no' once again, and Emil sighed, looking up at the ceiling.

Suddenly, someone started knocking on his window, which was covered by blue curtains. He turned to look at the window and stomped over to it, yanking the window open.

"Hey, Emil!" Leon said, waving at him through the window.

"Ugh," Emil groaned, rolling his eyes. "What do you want?"

"I have to leave in a few days-"

"That's good," Emil cut him off, crossing his arms. "Thanks for telling me."

"-stop cutting me off! Anyway, I just really want to hang out with you," Leon pleaded, frowning at him. "I'm tired of this game you're playing, do you like me or not?"

"First of all, it seems as though you've stolen these cliché lines from a country music song," Emil sighed. Leon looked guiltily at the ground. "Second of all, I'm not playing any games. Over the past few days, I've had more people arrive at this stupid prison house, had a chair thrown at me, had my best friend torn to pieces, and had more ghosts yell at me than probably anyone in the entire universe, including Ebenezer Scrooge. Right now I just want to be alone, is that too much to ask?"

"Yes! Nobody actually wants to be alone, even if they say so. Like, me? My home is constantly full! I have more brothers and sisters than I can count-okay, well, five-and I don't even know who my actual parents are! I always act indifferent to them, they don't think I like them much. But it's not because I want to be alone. I love my family, and I love you, and I think you should love your family too." 

"Dammit Leon, just shut up!" Emil yelled, closing the curtains.

From outside, Emil could hear his brothers voice, and Leon yelling,"OW!" He peeked through the curtains to see Lukas, a firm grip on Leon's ear, pulling him away from the window.

The scene seemed so ridiculously funny that Emil started laughing like a maniac, tears filling his eyes and running down his face.

"Emil, are you okay?" Peter asked from the door, a worried look on his face.

"Yep! Definitely!" Emil said, his eye twitching.

"You...look insane," The twelve-year-old continued, eyebrows raised.

"Come look at this! Hurry, before you miss it!" Emil opened the curtains and gestured for Peter to join him.

"Whoa!" Peter cried, eyes wide, watching as Lukas continued dragging Leon by the ear, then opened the door to Leon's (probably rented) car, throwing him inside.

"I know!"

"Hey, what's everyone laughing about?" Matthias asked, walking up behind them.

"Lukas was dragging Emil's boyfriend by the ear like an over-protective dad," Peter explained, and Emil stopped laughing, staring at the kid, who gave him a cheeky smile.

"Emil, you got a boyfriend?" Matthias chuckled, raising an eyebrow.

"NO!"

"Say, Peter, you never told us who your soulmate was." The Dane looked down at the child, who looked up at him, blue eyes sparkling.

Emil cringed at this and shook his head at Matthias, but he didn't notice.

"My soulmate?" Peter asked. "What do you mean?"

"Who do you see in the sky?"

"Oh," Peter frowned. "Um, well, he has a bandage on his nose, I think!"

Matthias smiled. "Hm, sounds cute," he mused, ruffling Peter's hair.

"Hey!"

"I hope you meet him soon, then."

Emil watched Matthias and Peter, then looked down at his hands, which were gripping the window sill tightly. "Hey, Matthias, can I borrow your car again?"

"Oo, ya going to run off with your 'not-boyfriend', Leon, now?" Matthias snickered, and Peter followed suit.

"We just met a few days ago," Emil said. "Besides, Lukas would never let me run off with him."

"Run off with who?"

*

Berwald was out in the garden again, taking a break from sewing Mr. Puffin back together. Tino was beside him, watching him weed.

"Do you need any help, Ber?" Tino asked, curiously.

"No," Berwald answered, looking back at him.

It was a windy day, and his hair was blowing every which way. The sky was dark and angry looking, and the clouds didn't take shape as they usually did. They never did during storms.

"Okay." Suddenly, a rumble of thunder sounded, and Tino looked at the sky. "H-Hey, um, we might want to go inside. I don't think this storm is going to take its time getting here."

Berwald looked up at the sky and narrowed his eyes, before grabbing the bucket of weeds and standing up, carrying it over to the compost bin.

The Finnish man walked over, with Hanatamago at his heels, shaking. "Hana's scared of thunder."

"Are you?" Berwald inquired, setting the bucket down, walking back to the house.

"Kind of," Tino answered, biting his lip. "Let's go inside."

Berwald opened the door, and Tino and the white dog followed. They closed the door behind them, and Hana ran away, probably to hide under the couch.

"So, how was the garden?" Matthias asked, grinning at them from the couch, where he was sitting with Peter, watching the television.

"Fine," Berwald answered, looking at the television before sighing.

"Hey, your son says that he has a soulmate."

"Oh?" Tino asked, while trying to coax Hana out from under the couch.

"Yeah!" Peter said, smiling. "He has a bandage on his nose, and he's really cute! I think he went to my school! He was an exchange student from Australia, can you imagine?"

"So, you 'think' he went to your school, but you know all of this stuff about him?" Tino asked, giving Peter a knowing look.

"Uh..." Peter looked sheepish. "Well, okay, maybe I knew him...a lot...and I saw his sister the other day at the pet store...so what?"

"Wait, what?" Matthias cried, staring at Peter. "You mean, you saw his sister? He was probably there, too! You could have said 'hi'!"

"I know, but that would've been embarassing," Peter mumbled, kicking at the floor.

Tino laughed. "Ah, okay." Then he looked around. "Wait, where's Emil and Lukas?"

"Emil is chasing after Leon, and Lukas is getting coffee from the grocery store," Peter said.

"Oh," Tino said, nodding. Then he looked at the TV, where an anime was playing. "Um, what's that?"

"It's an anime," Peter answered.

"I don't understand it," Matthias piped up, shrugging.

Berwald picked up the remote and turned the TV off, and Peter sighed. "You know, compared to the cardboard box, just turning the television off is way better."

"Hey, why'd you turn it off?" Asked the spiky-haired Dane, trying to grab the remote back. "I don't understand it, but-"

"You watch too much of the TV," Berwald said to Peter, and Peter rolled his eyes.

"You always say that," the boy grumbled, looking down at the floor. "I suppose you _are_ still better than Arthur, though."

"Well, I'm glad," Tino smiled, getting up off the floor, Hana squirming in his arms. He walked over to Peter and set the dog down on his lap, and she started licking Peter's face with her small pink tongue. Peter laughed, scratching her behind her ears.

"Arthur never let me have a dog."

Tino had noticed Peter talking about his biological father a lot more, and was honestly getting worried about it, though knowing it was probably going to take a while for him to get used to being away from him. "Do you miss him?" Tino asked, raising his eyebrows.

"Well, he is my biological father, I guess I kind of do. But he was a jerk, and hardly paid any attention to me. Whenever he did, it was to yell at me. And at night, ghosts and demons would stay in my room, staring at me." Peter shivered. "Here, even though I have to share a room with Emil, he's pretty nice and seems to care about me. And so does everyone else! So I'm glad!"

Suddenly, in the front room, someone could be heard sneaking around in the house.

"Emil?" Tino asked, raising his eyebrows as he looked down the hall. As his gaze landed on the two teenagers, they quickly tore their hands off of each other. "Who are you?" He directed the question at the boy Emil was with.

"I'm Leon Wang," the dark-haired boy answered, looking at him with blank, brown eyes.

Tino looked over at Emil, whose face was bright red, and nodded. "Oh...kay, then."

Matthias jumped in front of Tino, and Tino stared at him, shocked. "Hey, it's your not-boyfriend! Didja have fun?"

Berwald dragged Matthias out of the room before he could say anything else.

Emil looked at Tino, who was eyeing Leon, tapping his chin. Finally, he held out a hand and Leon took it, shaking it, keeping direct eye contact the whole time. "It's nice to meet you, Leon," he said, smiling.

"It's nice to meet you too," Leon answered, looking back over at Emil, who was hiding his face in his scarf. "Sorry for, like, intruding."

"Oh, no, it's perfectly fine!" Tino said, waving it off. "In fact, if you don't have anywhere to be, you could stay for dinner!"

"No thanks. Yao's making dumplings for dinner, and I never miss those." Tino's face fell as Leon turned back to Emil, pulling back his bangs and kissing his forehead. "Bye."

Emil's face turned bright red and he walked back to his room, slamming the door shut.

 


	17. Chapter 17

Berwald felt a sort of monotony in the days as they passed by.

He'd wake up, Tino would be there to cuddle him if he needed it. They'd eat breakfast. Then when everyone else was done with the bathroom, he'd take a shower, dry off, then put on some clothes and go outside to walk Hanatamago or work in the garden. Sometimes, Tino would help. But other times, Tino was with Peter, or trying to find a good school for Peter to go to.

Lukas and Matthias would probably end up sleeping together or going out to eat or just sitting in the living room, watching movies, cuddling. Sometimes, Peter or Emil would join them.

Emil would mostly hang out in his room and do absolutely nothing, or go outside and play with Hanatamago. He seemed to have a soft spot for both her and Peter. Berwald had finished fixing Emil's stuffed puffin, too, and the teenager never let him out of his sight. Sometimes, Leon would come over, and they would both play with Hanatamago, or just sit in the yard or Emil's room, talking.

Eduard had left after a few more days, promising to come back after awhile, when he didn't feel so useless. Berwald felt kind of worried about him, though Tino seemed to think he would be okay.

And so, Berwald could admit that the days were becoming a blur.

He saw everything coming from a mile away. He wasn't surprised, now, when he heard Lukas and Matthias in Matthias' room, late at night, doing something he'd rather not think about. He wasn't surprised when Tino hugged and kissed him, or looked up at him with his deep, indigo eyes sparkling, a smile on his face. He wasn't even surprised when he caught Emil and Leon kissing innocently, their faces pink.

Everything was the same.

He decided this on the fifteenth day in a row he had walked Hanatamago on the same exact road in the same exact direction.

He could remember a time when the world hadn't been so boring; when each day was new. When he found the ring on the carrot growing in the yard. When Tino came back. When Tino hugged him. When Tino kissed him. When he smiled at him and believed in him and loved him with all his heart.

He stopped, turned, and started walking back the way they'd come, despite the little white dog's tugging on the leash.

When he walked in the house, Peter was sitting on the couch with Lukas and Matthias, who were watching a horror movie, by the looks of it: Peter was watching through his fingers, his jaw dropped; Lukas was just laying across Matthias, staring blankly at the screen. And the Dane was hiding his face in a pillow.

They didn't notice Berwald, who walked past them, and found Tino sitting at the kitchen table, on the laptop, a determined expression on his face.

"Hey," Berwald said, walking around behind him.

"Oh, hey, Ber!" Tino said, turning around, smiling. "I'm just looking up schools. That was a quick walk, are you sure Hana got enough exercise?"

Bags had appeared under Tino's eyes, and Berwald noticed them, despite his smile. "S'everything okay, Tino?" Berwald asked, narrowing his eyes.

"Y-yeah! Of course!" Tino stuttered, his face falling. He looked up at Berwald, his face confused. "Why?"

"What are you really-"

"Okay, okay, you caught me! Sorry, I was just looking for the best place to go for our anniversary," Tino pouted. "I wanted it to be a surprise!"

The Swede froze, his blue eyes wide. The monotonous noise of the past month screeched to a halt. "What?"

"Our anniversary!"

"When's that?"

Tino sighed. "It's today, Ber."

Berwald immediately walked out the door after grabbing Matthias' keys off the counter.

"Ber?"

*

Tino stared at the sky.

The grass was soft and dry.

Hana was laying down in the sun a few meters away, her belly exposed and her paws up in the air.

He heard footsteps, and turned to see Leon. "Oh, hi, Leon!" He said, standing up.

Leon waved at him, then continued to walk.

Hana rolled back over and ran up to Leon, barking. Tino watched as the Cantonese leaned over and scratched the dog behind the ears, a small smile on his face.

"You should smile more often," Tino called.

"I know, but, like, I don't really have a reason to," Leon answered, looking over his shoulder at him.

"Yeah you do, you have Emil!"

Leon blushed, but opened the door and walked inside, closing the door behind him.

Tino sighed as he looked back up at the sky, wondering about what his soulmate was doing at that point. His thoughts were interrupted by a sudden loud noise.

"What the-"

"OW!"

Hana started scratching at the door, and Tino rushed over, opening it for her. He looked inside, and saw a smashed pile of clean plates on the floor, and Peter getting up off of Leon's back.

"What happened?" Tino asked, sighing.

"Sorry, I accidentally ran into him," Peter said, staring down at the broken plates.

"How many broken dishes will we have to clean up?" The Finnish man sighed, pinching the bridge of his nose.

Leon shook his head. "Don't worry, I can clean it," he said, walking into the kitchen and grabbing a broom and a dustpan.

"You don't have to, Ricey!" Matthias said, walking into the room, patting Leon on the back.

"Don't call me that," Leon said.

"Whoa, sorry. Was that racist or something? I just called you that because Emil's nickname is Icey."

Leon rolled his eyes and kept cleaning.

 


	18. Chapter 18

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ehehehehe

Berwald and Tino's anniversary did not go as planned.

Berwald had gotten Tino sweets, and Tino had gotten Berwald more of the purple flowers.

When they went out on their date, apparently it was to a nice dinner, which had been interrupted; partially because the two people sitting behind them kept whispering about how cute of a couple Tino and Berwald were and how they would look cute in a manga, and also because Tino had too much wine and tried to kiss their waiter, Lovino, who smacked him and hid behind his boyfriend, Antonio, who was waiting the table beside them. Or at least, they thought he did. They didn't see Lovino get out from behind Antonio, but they saw his hands disappear off of his shoulders.

When they went home, a drunk Tino asked Berwald if he was single the entire time.

Berwald let out a deep sigh and picked Tino up out of the car and carried him all the way to their room, setting him down on the bed and tucking him in.

*

Matthias woke up at around five in the morning, saw that Lukas was still asleep, and smiled, kissing him on the forehead-God, he was warm-before walking out of the room to the bathroom. Since the door was closed, he knocked on the door.

"Who is it?!"

"Whoa, geez, Emil, what's wrong?"

"Um, nothing." Matthias could hear frantic scuffling and something falling over on the floor.

"Emil?"

Emil flung open the door and slammed it behind him, standing protectively in front of it. "Nothing to see here."

"Did you sneak Leon in here again?"

"No."

Emil's face was steadily growing even redder than it already was, and Matthias shoved him out of the way and snatched open the door.

The window was open, and Leon was standing in front of it, his hands in his hoodie pockets. "Uh...hey."

"Hey there," Matthias said, raising his eyebrows. Leon turned back to the window and climbed out, and Emil rushed over and shut the window behind him. "Emil, we know about you and Leon, you don't have to-"

Emil facepalmed. "Shut up," he mumbled, his face so red he looked like a silver-haired tomato.

"You sound just like Lukas," Matthias replied. "And don't worry, I won't tell a soul," he winked, giving Emil a thumbs-up.

"Goodnight, Matthias."

"Well, I mean, technically it's morni-"

"GOODNIGHT, MATTHIAS."

Matthias raised his hands in surrender and Emil walked out of the bathroom, his face still bright red.

*

When Matthias got back from taking a shower, Lukas was still asleep. Looking at the clock on the wall, he saw it was seven and frowned. Usually, Lukas was up by six. Matthias looked down at the Norwegian, whose eyebrows were furrowed and his lips pursed. His chest rose and fell gently, but he looked concerned. "Lukas?"

Lukas' eyelids fluttered, and he squinted up at Matthias. "Hm?"

"It's seven," the Dane said, eyebrows raised. "Are you feelin' okay?"

Lukas shrugged, then pulled the blankets over himself. "Turn off the air-conditioning."

"It's not on."

"Then why is it so cold?"

"You have a fever, don't you?" Matthias sighed, pinching the bridge of his nose.

"Maybe," Lukas mumbled. He peeked out of the covers. "What do you want me to do?"

Matthias walked over to his wardrobe and pulled out a big stack of fluffy blankets.

"Not that many!"

Not even listening to him, Matthias took one off the stack and fluffed it out before throwing it over Lukas, then continued to throw blankets on top of him until the stack was empty and there was an eight inch addition to the bed.

"I said, 'Not that many'!" Lukas said, exasperated. He glared at Matthias. "Now it's too hot!" Lukas rolled over so he was on his side and hid under the covers again. "Take off ten of those."

"Nope."

"MATTHIAS!"

"...Stop yelling," Grumbled Berwald from the door, his eyes narrowed.

Matthias started laughing nervously and took off ten of the blankets, leaving five behind. "S-sorry," he said, smiling.

Berwald looked at Lukas, who gave him a knowing look. Then his gaze shifted back to Matthias. "You woke m'wife." Then, he turned around, walked out, and shut the door behind him.

"Good job, Dane," Lukas muttered.

"What's up with him?"

"I guess he just doesn't want to lose Tino again," the Norwegian said. "He just doesn't want us to annoy Tino so he doesn't up and leave again."

"Oh," Matthias frowned. "Do you think Ivan might try to take him again?"

"There would be no point, except to find Eduard." Lukas stared up at the ceiling. "Hey, Matthias?"

"Yeah?"

"Make sure that Emil gets to touch the Magical Northern Snakes when I'm gone, okay?"

Matthias' eyes widened, and he jolted upright, staring at Lukas. "What?! What do you mean, when you're gone?"

"Nothing," Lukas said.

Matthias rolled his eyes. "Stop talking about death."

"Death is inevitable."

"I know."

*

The next morning, Lukas was dead.


	19. Chapter 19

_"So, you're saying that I_ have _to die?" Lukas was sitting on the porch outside, frowning. Matthias was playing fetch with Hanatamago, and kept calling to Lukas, trying to get him to join in the game._

_"I'm sorry, Lukas, but yes," Arthur answered on the other end. "You used too much of your magic. You have only a small bit left to keep you alive, and if you want to get his memory back, you're going to have to use it up."_

_The Norwegian sighed and watched Matthias. "Jesus."_

_"I know, I know. It's hard to take s-"_

_"How am I going to tell them?" Lukas asked, his nose stinging, like it did when he was about to cry._

_Arthur hesitated, before answering. "I don't know."_

_"Why don't you ever put warnings in your spellbooks?"_

_"It's because I know better," Arthur answered. "I don't usually lend them to other people. But since you're even stronger than me, I'm honestly surprised that you lost all your magic this quickly."_

_Lukas hung up, not wanting to hear more, then sniffed, wiping his eyes._

_"Lukas? You okay?" Matthias asked, frowning at him. Hana cocked her head, and so did Matthias, which brought a slight smile to Lukas' face._

_"I guess," Lukas replied, stepping off the porch and walking over to them._

*

Berwald sat upright in bed, taking deep breaths of the cold air of his room.

Tino was still there. He felt him beside him, his gentle, calm breathing blowing across the Swede's face.

Ivan may have stopped hanging around the Køhler household, but he was still haunting Berwald's mind.

_You didn't...do something to him, da?_

He had crushed the purple flowers. He had killed his own soulmate, an innocent person. He had killed other people, too, most likely, and abused the people he lived with.

And yet, he never did that to Tino.

From the way Tino described his time at Ivan's, he was treated like a prince. Berwald knew it was only because the Russian thought Tino was Matthew, but what if Tino _did_ like it better with Ivan, instead of Berwald?

"Tino," he mumbled, looking over at his soulmate, laying quietly beside him.

"Hm?" The Finn hummed, rolling over to look at him. "What's wrong?"

Berwald looked at Tino's gentle face and sighed, not wanting to ask the questions on his mind. He couldn't, knowing he'd hurt his feelings if he did so. "Nevermind."

Tino pursed his lips. "Are you sure?"

The Swede nodded, and shifted so he was facing him. "I love you."

"I love you too, Berwald," Tino replied, reaching out in the dark, finding Berwald's hand and squeezing it. "But don't hesitate to tell me if something's wrong."

"Right."

"So, you haven't remembered anything else?"

"No," Berwald sighed.

"Okay," was all that Tino said in response.

They laid in silence for a while, until suddenly, they heard feet pounding against the floor and their door swinging open.

"GET UP!" Matthias yelled, grabbing Berwald's arm, trying to tug him out of the bed, only managing to move him a few inches.

"Why?" Tino asked, frowning at him, reaching over and turning on the light.

Matthias' face was pale, all the blood drained from his face. "Something's wrong with Lukas."

After that, the Finn ran out of the room, down the hall, and into Matthias' room, and he gasped at what he saw. "Oh my God..."

Lukas was not breathing.

Matthias came back into the room behind him, his blue eyes terrified. "Is he okay? Maybe he's just in a coma or something? Or maybe still breathing but every time he does we're blinking?"

Berwald stepped into the room, looking down at Lukas, reaching out to feel his heartbeat. Without another word, he left the room and went outside.

Tino frowned at Matthias. "Um..."

"He's...?"

Tino swallowed hard and nodded.

Matthias' eye twitched ever so slightly, then a tear slipped down his cheek, and another, and another, until he was sobbing shamelessly, holding Tino close to him, tears soaking his shirt.

"Matthias-"

*

_That first night in the car with Matthias, they had slept together in the backseat._

_When Lukas woke up, he almost fell off the seat, surprised at Matthias being so close to him._

_"Whoa there, elsker, what's wrong?" Matthias asked, sitting up, his hair sticking up every which way._

_Lukas laughed inwardly, but crawled back into the front seat, shaking his head. "We have to go get Peter. Arthur said he would meet us at the park."_

_Matthias rubbed his head. "My head hurts."_

_"Congratulations."_

_"No, it really hurts," Matthias said, blinking. "Is it because of the new memories?"_

_"Did you wake up during the night?"_

_"Yeah? Why?"_

_Lukas slammed his head on the wheel, and the car let out a long beep. He turned and glared at Matthias. "You weren't supposed to wake up. Now your memory might be even more messed up."_

_"No, it's okay," Matthias replied, rubbing his temples. "My memory's fine. And even if I did lose all those memories, I'd still have you and Emil and Tino and even Berwald-well, MAYBE Berwald."_

_"Cut the sentimental stuff," Lukas grumbled._

_"Jeg elsker dig, Lukas~"_

_"Shut up."_

_Matthias reached around the carseat and hugged him around the middle, and Lukas' face grew bright red._

_"What are you doing?"_

_"Hugging you, what does it look like?"_

_"I'm driving, Matthias."_

_"And?"_

_The Norwegian sighed and pulled over again, turning around and giving his a kiss. "Jeg elsker deg, Dane," Lukas mumbled, as he turned back around._

_The happiest Dane in the world smiled at him. "Yay! You finally admitted it, you love me! I knew it!"_

_*_

_After Lukas had finally dragged Matthias away from the bunny, the Dane had asked if he could walk around on his own for awhile, since he had seen a sweets store._

_"Um, sure," Lukas replied, looking down at Peter. "Be back here by twelve."_

_"Okay!" Matthias sprinted off, and Lukas rolled his eyes._

_"Can we go back to that pet store?" Peter asked, pointing back over to the girl, who was now holding the white bunny that she'd been looking at. Someone, probably her older brother, was patting its head, and the girl kept yelling at him for being to rough with it. The brother rolled his eyes and started talking back to her, but then saw Peter and smiled, waving at him._

_Peter's face grew bright red and he hid behind Lukas. "Who's that?" Lukas asked, moving out from in front of Peter._

_"Jett," Peter mumbled, kicking at the ground._

_"Go talk to him," Lukas said, frowning down at him. "He's your soulmate, right?" Peter nodded. "Then go."_

_Peter did go, and the boy, Jett, gave him a big hug._

_Lukas smiled a bit, until Matthias rammed into him from behind and they fell on the ground._

_"OW!"_

_"Sorry, Lukas!" Matthias laughed, climbing off of him. He was carrying a bag and pulled a smaller bag out of the bag, handing it to him. "I just couldn't wait to get back here!"_

_Lukas pulled something out of the bag, and Matthias wasn't even paying attention to Peter and Jett behind Lukas, he was just staring at the Norwegian man._

_"Matthias?" Lukas asked, looking up at him._

_"Yeah?"_

_"What's this for...?"_

_"Oh! It's a ring I found. I'm wearing the matching one. Uh, people wear matching rings when they're married, right?"_

_"Yes."_

_"Then when we get back home, will you marry me?"_

_*_

_Tino Väinämöinen and Berwald Oxenstierna were in love._

_There was no doubt about it._

_Everyone in Matthias Køhler's house knew they were together, were soulmates. They spent time together every day, wore matching rings, and they both cared about each other._

_However, one night, after a nasty fight, Tino dissappeared to Ivan Braginsky's place to stay for a few days until he cooled down. He certainly hadn't planned staying there for four years._

_But yet, he woke up early one morning to get a glass of water, and next thing he knew, he was knocked out._

_He woke up the next morning in an unfamiliar place, with three new faces staring at him._

_"Ah, you're up," said the one with the long brown hair. He was biting his lip nervously. "Um, are you okay?"_

_Tino rubbed the back of his head, where he felt a dull ache and a sizable lump. "Yeah," he replied. "Who are you?"_

_"I'm Toris," answered the brunette._

_"Raivis," the shortest one said, quietly._

_The one wearing the glasses was the only one who was kind of smiling. "I'm Eduard. Uh, welcome to our house."_

_"Why am I here?"_

_Eduard shrugged. "I don't know. Mas-Mr. Braginsky just brought you in here a couple hours ago."_

_Raivis nodded. "Are you okay? I can bring you a book or something."_

_"No, I'm fine. I'll just rest for a while, if that's all right."_

_"Okay," Toris said, turning to Eduard and Raivis, and all three of them walked out of the room, closing the door behind them._

Well, that was weird _, Tino thought, frowning. Of all the times he had been to Ivan's house, he had never seen those three._

_He had no idea what was going on, but he wanted to get out of this house as soon as possible and get back to Berwald. he felt really bad about the things he'd said to him, and he knew Berwald didn't cope well after fights._

God, I'm a fucking idiot.

 I wonder how he's doing...


	20. Chapter 20

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Last chapter!!!

The clouds, after fourteen years, were normal again.

Some soulmate couples, having no idea what happened, split up. Other couples, the ones who were truly in love, didn't even notice.

Matthias stood at the tree at the edge of the yard that Lukas was under. His blue eyes were dull, no longer having the mischievous, happy spark they had always had. And yet, he couldn't cry anymore. He was beyond tears at this point.

Emil was in his room, leaning his back against the door. He had been the last one to know when Lukas died, because they had all been too cowardly to tell him. He knew his skin was growing pale, there were bags under his eyes, and his stomach was grumbling louder every second he didn't eat. Tino tried to bring him food-obviously, he didn't eat it. Sometimes, Leon would come over with some of his older brother's mangas for them to read. And sometimes, he wouldn't bring anything at all. He'd just come in the door, lock it, and wrap his arms around Emil, telling him it would be okay.

Lukas, meanwhile, was trying to communicate with Matthias, but Matthias never listened. He would look up at Lukas' ghost, smile a bit, then look back down at his feet.

Berwald spent more time in the garden. Tino was freaking out over Emil and Lukas and Matthias still, and had no idea what to do to help.

"Tino," Berwald stopped him one day, looking him straight in the eye. "It's not your problem."

"But it is!"

Berwald sighed. "It's not. You can't force them to be happy."

Toris, Raivis, Eduard, and sometimes even Feliks came over. Feliks would talk about his pony, while Toris tried to politely shut him up. Raivis mostly just sat and read romance novels and shook and twitched oddly.

"Tourettes," he said, after Berwald commented on it.

Eduard was trying to cheer Tino up, and trying to prove that he and Berwald were related in some way.

Speaking of Tino, he had finally told Berwald about the reason he had gone to Ivan's house in the first place. Berwald didn't react with much, he just nodded. "Okay," he replied, walking off the their room, perhaps to think. Tino was so relieved, he took Berwald to a bar the next night and got wasted. Again.

Hanatamago had found two animals living under the couch: a polar bear and a dog. She hung out with them a lot, until an odd floating white ball with glasses took the bear away, and the dog walked away, seeming bored.

Mr. Puffin had a new friend, since Leon had started bringing the stuffed panda he had gotten from his older brother, Yao, over.

Speaking of Yao, he and Ivan had never really gotten together. Ivan refused to love anyone other than Matthew, who had obviously moved on. Yao did love Ivan, however, and tried to reason with him about living in the past. However, Ivan obviously never listened.

The air was chill, as per usual.

Matthias was sitting under Lukas' tree again, staring at the sky and talking partially to Lukas and partially to himself. Berwald and Tino had honestly expected him to be building snowmen everywhere, because of the snow they had gotten a few nights before. However, he was still mourning his fiancé, wearing black, both rings on a necklace around his neck. Emil was sitting next to him with Mr. Puffin, Lukas' ghost form perched on his shoulder. Matthew, Gilbert, and the other ghost, Lovino, were conversing with Hanatamago. Tino was with Berwald, sitting in the snow, content, watching as Peter and his new friends ran around, having a snowball fight.

Finally, Matthias stood up and walked over to Peter, who was packing snow together in a snowball. He asked him something quietly, and Peter nodded, handing him the snowball. A mischievous smile was on the Dane's face for the first time since Lukas died.

The next thing Berwald knew, the missile had hit him right in the face.

"Oh, are you okay?" Tino asked, between giggles.

The Swede reached his hand up and wiped his face off with his sleeve, then glared over at Matthias, who was smiling sheepishly. His smile almost looked like it used to, despite how pale he was and the bags under his eyes.

And the next thing Matthias knew, he was running from Berwald, who was throwing the snow at him with terrifying precision, hitting him every time.

*

Peter was asleep on the couch, the old VHS he was watching having long since stopped, the screen just showing grey, black, and white pixels. Berwald pressed the rewind button on the VCR, and the tape rewound loudly. He looked back over at the couch, where Tino was sleeping too, his hair haloing his face.

No, Tino was definitely happier with Berwald. He'd been stupid to think otherwise. He was smiling, twisting the six-pointed sapphire ring around his finger in his sleep. Not wanting to wake his soulmate up, he picked him up and carried him to their room, laying him down on the mattress, covering him up with blankets and laying down next to him.

Despite Berwald being gentle, Tino's indigo eyes opened anyway, peering at Berwald for a few seconds before smiling.

"Goodnight, Berwald."

"Night, Tino," he said quietly, giving him a small smile, taking off his glasses and setting them next to the wooden dog on the nightstand. Tino shifted around and sighed in discontent. "What's wrong?" Berwald asked, raising his eyebrows.

"Isn't it a bit cold?"

"You think?" Berwald frowned at all the blankets, confused at how Tino was still cold. But he shifted over anyway and wrapped his arms around him. "Is it warm?"

The Finn smiled at him and nodded, before closing his eyes again.

_Huh, from now on, I'll be living with this guy. Um, again._

He laughed inwardly, then opened his eyes and looked back up at Berwald, whose blue eyes were still open, watching him.

"Ber, go to sleep."

Things may have been different, but they still loved each other.

_I think we're going to be okay._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for sticking with me, folks :)   
> If you enjoyed the story, I'm glad you enjoyed it! It's really not my best work (after all, it was written, like, five months ago), and it was my first Hetalia fanfic. But!!! Still, thanks for all the nice feedback! I love getting positive reviews!! But then, don't we all...? 
> 
> Stay tuned for more Hetalia fanfics. In fact, I have a Spamano fanfic that I finished writing a few weeks ago, for any of you who ship that. It's in the same universe as this story, so I guess you could say it's a ???prequel??? 
> 
> Anyway! Have a good day/night!


End file.
